


Prisoner No. 394

by angeliz_06



Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians & Related Fandoms - All Media Types, Percy Jackson and the Olympians - Rick Riordan
Genre: Annabeth Chase/Percy Jackson Smut, BAMF Annabeth Chase (Percy Jackson), BAMF Percy Jackson, Dark Percy, F/M, Grover (Percy Jackson) is a Good Friend, Hurt Percy, M/M, Percy Jackson Needs a Hug, Slow Burn, Smut, but he also wants to rule the world so theres that, kronos has issues, kronos is actually decent and cares about percy
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-20
Updated: 2021-01-27
Packaged: 2021-03-11 05:00:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 6
Words: 24,728
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28199544
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/angeliz_06/pseuds/angeliz_06
Summary: Thalia Grace, the child of the Great Prophecy, made her choice and gave Annabeth's knife to Luke. He was ready to sacrifice himself to end Kronos, she could see it in his eyes.He never got the chance to.
Relationships: Annabeth Chase & Percy Jackson, Annabeth Chase/Percy Jackson, Luke Castellan & Annabeth Chase, Luke Castellan & Percy Jackson, Percy Jackson & Grover Underwood, Percy Jackson & Kronos
Comments: 41
Kudos: 140





	1. Prologue: Preserve or Raze

ᴀ ʜᴀʟꜰ-ʙʟᴏᴏᴅ ᴏꜰ ᴛʜᴇ ᴇʟᴅᴇꜱᴛ ɢᴏᴅꜱ,

ꜱʜᴀʟʟ ʀᴇᴀᴄʜ ꜱɪxᴛᴇᴇɴ ᴀɢᴀɪɴꜱᴛ ᴀʟʟ ᴏᴅᴅꜱ,

ᴀɴᴅ ꜱᴇᴇ ᴛʜᴇ ᴡᴏʀʟᴅ ɪɴ ᴇɴᴅʟᴇꜱꜱ ꜱʟᴇᴇᴘ,

ᴛʜᴇ ʜᴇʀᴏ'ꜱ ꜱᴏᴜʟ, ᴄᴜʀꜱᴇᴅ ʙʟᴀᴅᴇ ꜱʜᴀʟʟ ʀᴇᴀᴘ,

ᴀ ꜱɪɴɢʟᴇ ᴄʜᴏɪᴄᴇ ꜱʜᴀʟʟ ᴇɴᴅ ʜɪꜱ ᴅᴀʏꜱ,

ᴏʟʏᴍᴘᴜꜱ ᴛᴏ ᴘʀᴇꜱᴇʀᴠᴇ ᴏʀ ʀᴀᴢᴇ.  
  
  


Thalia Grace could only watch as Kronos struck Annabeth, flinging her fragile, broken body away from him. Blood roared in her ears as Annabeth's crumpled form hit the ground with a muffled but painful thud. She desperately tried to move closer to her friend, but it was like wading through a sea of honey.

Luke - no, _Kronos_ , she reminded herself as he turned molten gold eyes on her - smirked at her pathetic effort and tilted his head, slowing time around her even more. Even with every ounce of her willpower, she couldn't manage even a centimeter forward. She could only watch as Kronos loomed over Annabeth, his sword raised to make a fatal blow.

"Annabeth!" Thalia screamed, her vocal chords ripping themselves apart as Annabeth spun around to face the Titan Lord. Thalia felt tears pricking at her eyes as her desperation grew. She knew that Annabeth wouldn't be able to take Kronos by herself. Not because she wasn't strong - Annabeth was one of the strongest people Thalia knew - but because her enemy was wearing the face of Luke Castellan.

Kronos's lips twisted in a cruel smile as he zoned in on her, the muscles in Luke's arms tensing as he readied his blade.

Annabeth wasn't moving away from him.

What was she _doing?_

Kronos was ready to strike her down, snuff out her life like it meant nothing, and she wasn't even trying to escape her fate.

" _Family_ , Luke," Annabeth croaked out. "You promised..."

Kronos faltered in his advance toward her.

Something shifted in his eyes.

His knees suddenly buckled and he nearly toppled to the ground right in front of her. He gasped out.

It wasn't a sound of pain, like Thalia would have expected it to be. It was more like the sound of someone who had nearly drowned finally getting the air they needed back into their lungs. A sound of both desperation and bone-crushing relief. "Promise..." His expression creased for a moment. Then it cleared. " _Annabeth_."

The viscous air enveloping Thalia let up slightly. Her hand flew to her mouth as she choked out a sob at the sound of her oldest friend's voice. _Luke_ , she mouthed, not trusting herself to say his name aloud. Silent tears trailed down her dirt and blood-encrusted cheeks.

"You're bleeding..." the familiar voice continued. Luke's eyes betrayed infinite sadness as they raked over Annabeth's damaged body.

"My knife." Annabeth grunted and struggled to raise her dagger. It fell out of her hand, clattering onto the ground. Luke's eyes followed it, but he didn't move away or toward it. Annabeth's gaze found Thalia's, her expression imploring and grief-stricken. Everything suddenly clicked in Thalia's head. She knew what Annabeth was thinking. "Thalia..."

Thalia paced forward, noticing she no longer met any form of resistance. She made her way to the fallen knife and gingerly picked it up, her fingers shaky against its cursed hilt. Luke's gaze shot to her. His weapon slipped from his grasp at the sight of his former friends - his former _family_ \- standing before him, hurt and damaged as a direct result of his own actions. Thalia took an extra step to place herself in between him and Annabeth. His attention was now completely on her. Good.

Luke's lips parted to say something. Thalia wasn't sure what it would be. She didn't even know if she could bring herself to listen to whatever he said. An apology, a plea for her understanding - but she never got to figure it out. His body started to glow, pulsating with a horrible golden light. A broken cry escaped his lips and he convulsed on himself with pain.

"He's changing," Luke shouted. "He won't need my body anymore... _Please-"_

"NO!"

Thalia nearly jumped back when the roaring voice of Kronos clanged through the tense air, shattering the strained calm between three old friends. Luke's face grew unnaturally cruel and angry once more. He spun around, his hand grasping for something that wasn't there. Thalia quickly kicked his weapon out of reach. It skidded against the marble floors and hit a far wall with a low echo.

Kronos sneered at Thalia and slapped her away before she could react. She landed on the floor, sprawled next to Annabeth, her head making a harsh impact with an object behind her that she didn't care to identify.

"Thalia," Annabeth whispered. "Hero... Cursed blade..."

"I know," Thalia murmured.

Kronos didn't even make it half the distance to his weapon when, all of a sudden, his knees collapsed on themselves. He grunted, his face screwed up in pain as he slowly turned towards Thalia and Annabeth. Thalia clutched Annabeth's knife and forced herself to her feet. She knew with a sinking heart what she had to do now.

"You can't do it yourself," Luke breathed, as if he knew exactly what she was thinking. "He'll break my control, d-defend himself... Only _my hand_..." His skin radiated with a brighter light. Thalia hastily brought a hand over her eyes to shield her vision, never letting her guard down, her hand clamped down on the hilt of Annabeth's knife like her life depended on it. Smoke began to emit from Luke's skin.

Luke cried out. Thalia felt sick watching her old friend in such agony while there was nothing she could do but stand there and watch. "Please... No time." Thalia knew he was right. Maybe it would be a few seconds, maybe it would be a few minutes, but eventually Kronos would grow strong enough to cast away Luke's body and assume his true form. When that happened, none of them stood a chance.

_The hero's soul cursed blade shall reap._

Thalia steeled herself, praying to whoever was listening that she was making the right call. The whole world depended on it.

She handed her oldest friend the means of his death.

She stood, completely defenseless and exposed, as Luke took hold of the bronze weapon. She watched as he slowly unlatched a piece of his armor. _An Achilles Heel_ , she realized with a shock. Kronos must have forced him to bathe in the Styx. _Oh, Luke..._

Luke's eyes closed as he readied the tip of the dagger. He brought back his hand and made a sharp motion downwards. His aim would be impeccable as always. Thalia braced herself-

But the knife never made it.

Luke's arm suddenly seized up as if time had slowed down around him instead. His fingers shook violently. Panic rose like a tidal wave in Thalia's chest, her fight or flight instinct going off, and she surged forward with every intention of stabbing her best friend.

She couldn't move either. Her limbs froze up, her head the only part of her body capable of movement. "What in Zeus's name...?" she muttered. 

"I wouldn't do that if I were you."

Thalia whipped her head around to see a single boy standing near the entrance to the Throne Room. His left hand was in the pockets of his jeans, his right hand raised in a lazy gesture. Sea-green eyes were narrowed in intense concentration, his focus never leaving Luke's hand.

Abruptly, Thalia realized that this kid was the reason neither she nor Luke could move.

"Percy?"

Luke's voice betrayed his bewilderment as his gaze fell on the raven-haired boy. The boy raised his eyebrows faintly as he walked over, his strides steady and confident, his posture never wavering. Beams of golden light broke through Luke's skin and he screamed in agony. The boy wordlessly plucked Annabeth's knife from Luke's hand and threw it aside offhandedly.

"What are you doing?" Thalia cried out. She grunted, the veins in her neck bulging as she tried her hardest to launch herself at this kid - to simply knock him out or pummel him, she didn't know - but in any case, her efforts were in vain.

"Quiet." The boy didn't even spare her a glance, his attention on Kronos.

Thalia stubbornly tried again. "Don't you understand what's happening? We're all going to _die_ if Kronos leaves Luke's body. We have to end him now! Why are you _helping_ him?"

This time, the boy offered her a glare, his eyebrows raised as if appraising her. He took a step closer, lowering his hand and sliding it back into his pockets. The hold over Thalia's limbs didn't let up. Thalia bit her lip, feeling genuine fear not for the first time that day. Who was this kid?

"You're Thalia Grace." It wasn't a question. The boy tilted his head as a thoughtful expression replaced his look of concentration. Thalia didn't find the strength in herself to ask how in the world he knew that. It shouldn't have come as a surprise to her, considering he was working for Kronos. "Luke's friend."

"He's in pain," Thalia whispered, ashamed to realize that it came out as a sob. As much as she resented Luke for how much he had hurt her and Annabeth, she wouldn't wish this fate upon anyone. He deserved to die as a hero, even if it meant sacrificing himself. Were the Fates so cruel that they wouldn't even grant him this mercy?

The boy nodded nonchalantly, though she caught a flicker of grief in the depths of his eyes. It struck her how young he was. He couldn't be less than a year younger than her, around fifteen. What was a boy like that doing with Kronos of all beings? She had never seen him at Camp Half-Blood before or anywhere else. Where were his parents?

This had to be a form he was taking, Thalia concluded uneasily. A disguise. No demigod could have managed what he was doing to both herself and Luke. The kid must be an immortal taking the form of a young boy. That could be the only explanation.

Luke screamed and he fell on his knees, his skin cracking apart. The boy's gaze shot to Thalia and Annabeth, who was looking on the scene with poorly-disguised horror. "If you want to live," the boy told them, "get yourselves out now. His presence will be too much for you to handle once he breaks free."

"No," Annabeth protested. "Then Kronos will take over Olympus. He'll take over the world from here. Millions will die. We can't just let that happen!"

"I'm going to give you twenty seconds to leave," the boy said calmly, not the slightest bit perturbed by Annabeth's plea, "and if you're still here, I won't lift a finger to save you. If you want to go out like that, fine, I could care less, but I for one would want to live to fight another day. Look around you. You can't even _move_ unless I allow it. What do you think you can possibly do to stop him?"

Thalia exchanged glances with Annabeth. She hated it, but the boy was right. There was nothing that could be done now. They might have stood a chance against Kronos before, but with this boy in the equation, all their hopes for victory had vanished into thin air.

She was going to hate herself for the rest of her life and she knew it. She had let everyone down. She was supposed to be the prophesied hero who would save Olympus. Thalia chuckled bitterly. Some hero she turned out to be.

If she had been a little bit braver, she thought, she would have held her ground and gone down fighting. She would die, but at least she wouldn't give up. A hero wouldn't do that.

A hero wouldn't run away, dooming the world to an era of terror and death.

But that's precisely what she did.


	2. The Contestant

The jagged piece of rock scraped harshly against the prison of stone, pressing deep into the surface of its cold walls. Gradually, it made its way downwards, slight grunts of effort escaping its wielder as the rock's work was finally accomplished. It fell to the ground, not to be picked up until the same time the next day.

Thirty-one lines glared back at her, _mocking_ her, calling her worthless for not being able to find a way out, for giving up, as she stared at them. She swallowed hard, eyeing how much she had left on the walls. She could fit decades' worth in this wretched space.

 _One month_.

Annabeth had been locked in here for a month. It didn't seem quite right to her. Although the timely meals and daily taunts from the monsters that guarded her cell had all blended together by now, she thought her time here should have been longer. If anything, it would make her feel relieved at how utterly lost she felt. A month wasn't enough to do this to her, to break her this way. Three perhaps, four definitely, but _one_ shouldn't have this great of an effect on her.

But it did.

Did that make her weak?

She eyed the rock laying an inch away from her right hand. How many more times would she be able to use it? How long before it fell apart, a spitting yet delayed reflection of its user? She didn't think she could stand not knowing how many days had passed in her imprisonment. Yes, seeing the haunted lines made her heart sink lower with every glance she spared them, but it also kept her occupied. It gave her something to hold onto. Organization.

Maybe that was crazy, she wouldn't be surprised at this point if the isolation of her environment had made her go mad. But just the simple act of keeping something so trivial brought her comfort, made her remember a time when things were easier.

Gods, had those times only been a month ago?

She shook her head in disbelief, still frowning down at her precious stone. What would she do without it? A soft light now dappled against its surface. With a knowing grimace, she tipped her head back against the wall to observe the small barred window of the back wall in her cell. All of the prisons had them.

Her first thought the day she'd been thrown in here had been one of relief. Her captors may be cruel but at least they'd offer her this small freedom. It wouldn't be for long, but at least she could get _some_ glimpse into the outside world, the world she might never return to.

Then she had looked outside the window. It had taken her no time at all to instantly remove herself from its view, her back sliding against the then foreign stone walls as she shook and trembled with horror.

Needless to say, it wasn't a view of the outside world.

Each prison had a window that opened into a grand chamber. Light beamed down from the ceiling of it, illuminating both the chamber and all the cells somewhat. It was large enough that if Annabeth somehow gained the courage to look, she could see the hundreds of windows lining the round walls, going up and down for miles and miles with no end in sight, save for the beacon of light somewhere at the top. Like they were all locked at the bottom of a dark, abandoned well.

When she'd first arrived here, she had wondered if she could somehow break down the bars of her window and climb out. Then she could use the other windows as ledges and handholds to climb her way to the top, to the light, the escape, she so desperately craved. But her sharp mind had immediately warned her that it was too far away; she would never make it.

Then she'd heard the screaming, and her resolve to escape had shattered completely. She still hadn't picked up the pieces.

The space all the windows opened up to was a torture chamber. _The_ torture chamber, where the monsters dwelling around them tortured mortals, humans and demigods alike, for the mere pleasure of it. It was sickening and cruel. The screams had never waned for more than a few hours. They got the worst when it was dark, when the light didn't shine in the chamber, when the monsters couldn't see what they were aiming for on the poor mortal's weak body. They could be aiming for a finger with a hammer but hit a skull instead.

Thankfully, Annabeth had worked out their routine early on and had taken care to fall asleep an hour before it started. The first two weeks had been difficult, nearly impossible, but now she could almost block them out.

But to stay asleep all night, she needed to stay awake during the day. Unfortunately, the screams didn't stop there. And they always lasted longer, the monsters' visions improved from the clearness and light to their surroundings.

The screams started.

They cut through the silent air, as sharp as broken glass and sudden like a strike of lightning through a cloudless sky.

Annabeth clamped her hands against her ears hard, praying against all odds that her guards would bring her her breakfast early. While the bread they threw at her was nearly impossible to bite down on, much less tear into pieces, at least it would serve as a distraction and her own loud chewing would muffle the painful noises somewhat.

The first time, all the demigods locked in the cells had bellowed and roared at the cruel monsters, men, and women carrying out the torture, pleading with them to stop. Those pleas had since died down when they realized it was no use.

Annabeth wasn't stupid. She knew that the placement of their prison had been deliberate. The endless screams, the light of the exit so close but yet so far away... It was all intended to break them.

And it was working, if it hadn't already worked.

She sighed, breathing in and out heavily while keeping her ears plugged. _In... and out. In... and... out._

For a moment, she almost felt at peace. Her racing heart had slowed down to a steady beat, no longer hammering against her rib cage. She even lowered her hands from her ears. The screaming had stopped.

Then she heard the crying.

She was tempted to snap at the offender to shut up. Weeks in prison had made her far more irritable than she had been before. At the last second, she calmed herself down, her already slowed-down breathing doing the brunt of the work, and realized the sounds were coming from the cell next to her.

Last time she checked, it had been a boy in the cell next to her. A Roman demigod, she had found out, a rather rude one at that. The cries sounded like they were coming from a young girl, not that far away from Annabeth in age. That could only mean that she had... replaced the rude Roman demigod.

In other words, the Roman demigod was dead.

Annabeth suddenly felt sick to her stomach at the thought that any one of the gut-wrenching screams could have been his. No one deserves that fate.

A small, selfish part of her wondered if she was next. If there was a pattern to these torture sessions, it could be her turn soon since she was in the cell one over. Her knees sobbed slightly, her throat constricting on herself. The screams she was drowning out now must be his.

"Hey..." Her voice cracked as she tried to get the word out. If she could hear the young girl's soft sobs from here, her low murmur might reach the girl, too. She cleared her throat, wincing at how her vocal chords grated against each other from disuse. "Hey," she tried again.

The sobs ceased for a moment. Annabeth scooted over to the left wall and pressed her ear against it, cursing under her breath as the icy surface met her warm skin. "You're going to be alright," she breathed. It was quite possibly the biggest lie she had ever said in her life. But false hope was better than no hope at all. "How long have you been in there?"

"Five minutes at least," came the quiet voice, still shaky from her cries. Her voice was melodic, almost soothing in a way. Annabeth closed her eyes, drinking in the sound of another human voice. Gods, it had been so long... "I was a few levels above this one up until today. They just..." she sniffled. "They dragged me out and threw me in here. Took a tall-brown haired kid out and replaced him with me... They said it was _his turn_. Does that mean..."

Annabeth hesitated. The girl was already in a poor state as it was... "Yeah," she murmured, deciding that the truth was better, no matter how painful. They didn't have the luxury of ignoring their reality in this place. "I think that was him."

The screams hadn't picked up again. Annabeth realized with a sinking heart that the Roman demigod was now dead. At least it had been quick. Some of the others hadn't been so lucky, their agony lasting hours before they were granted the mercy of death.

That also meant that her intuition had been correct. She was next. Now that the boy was dead, they would be coming for her now. Her heartbeat started to pick up again and she shuffled away from the door to her cell, pressing her back flat against the wall as far as she could, her gaze never leaving the entrance to her cell.

She was going to die.

She laughed softly. One month of nothing but survival, according to her tally marks on the wall. She had thought herself strong for holding out this long. Look where that got her. She was just as doomed as the rest of them. It had all been for nothing.

"I don't recognize your voice," she managed. Talking had always helped to distract her, ease her nerves. Focusing her thoughts on the fact that she was going to die wouldn't prevent her death. Oh gods, she was going to die. She grunted and shook her head violently in an attempt to clear her thoughts. "Y-You're not from Camp-Half-Blood, are you?"

"No, but my old cell neighbor was," the girl replied. It sounded like she was grateful for the conversation, too. Annabeth remembered a time where talking was something she did with her friends and cabin mates. They had joked around, talked about their futures should they survive the hard way of demigod life... Now the social norm had been reduced to an escape from their own traumas. "His name's Will."

"Will Solace?"

"Yeah, that's him."

Annabeth slumped against the wall, smiling a little. He was still alive, then. At least some of them would be able to hold out a little longer. "You're a demigod, though, right?"

"Roman demigod. Daughter of Pluto." Hades? Annabeth's eyebrows shot up in surprise. "I'm from Camp Jupiter." Annabeth stifled a snort. Of course Zeus would insist a camp be named after him. "I'm Hazel, by the way."

Annabeth didn't know what to say to that. Nice to meet you? Even in her own head, it felt like the wrong thing to say. She was going to die soon, the least she could do was spare Hazel from getting to know her personally. Getting attached to someone just gave you more to grieve for when they were inevitably taken from you. She had learned that the hard way.

"I'm Annabeth," was what she settled on. "Daughter of Athena - er... Minerva to you, I guess." She winced. _I guess?_ Everyone in the Athena Cabin knew their mom's Roman counterpart was Minerva! It seemed her social skills had been lost along with her hope. What a comforting thought before her inevitable death. "Have you met your father?"

There was a pause there and Annabeth wondered if she'd said the wrong thing. "No, I haven't." Hazel's tone had a hint of bitterness to it that Annabeth could fully understand. "But I've met my brother. Half-brother. Nico?"

Yeah, Annabeth knew Nico. He was a good kid. She was about to say so when she suddenly heard the footsteps echoing in the hallway. They grew louder, the butt of a spear tapping on the ground like her guard was using it as a walking stick. Metal armor clanked and jangled as the door of the cell swung open. Annabeth tried moving further away but she was already against the wall.

She looked around desperately for a weapon she could use. The meager meals they had chucked at her kept her alive, but they didn't keep her strength up. She couldn't take on her guard - a demigod who'd sided with Kronos, apparently - with her bare hands anymore. Her gaze fell on the rock. Like that was any good to her.

The guard strode into her cell. A bronze helmet settled itself on his head, the rest of his body decked out in similar wear. His face was left uncovered, brown eyes staring back at her with an ugly scar curving from his nose to his cheek to his lip. It reminded Annabeth of Luke a little. She quickly pushed that out of her mind. The last thing she needed was to think of _him_.

"Annabeth Chase," the guard said. His voice was cold and absolute. There would be no convincing him to spare her. "It's your turn." A shiver ran down Annabeth's spine. That's what they'd said to her old cell neighbor before he was taken away. Her death was near, so frighteningly close. "Stand up."

"No."

The guard's face crinkled with frown lines, his eyes narrowing to chips of ice and stone. "Would you rather I knock you out? They won't let you die in your sleep, you know. If anything, when you wake up, the pain will be much greater than if you come with me willingly right now."

Annabeth wanted to shout back that she didn't care about the pain. She was stronger than that.

Only she wasn't. She feared what they would do to her, so much that she reckoned she could have a heart attack right on the spot. She slowly rose to her feet, taking a flimsy step forward. Then another. And another. Until she was in line with her guard.

He wasted no time, jutting a hand forward to shove her back and push her out of the cell. She gasped at the pressure but complied, her feet moving of their own accord. Her strides were unstable and insecure. She hadn't walked this much since a month ago.

She noticed that the guard didn't cuff her or bother with any restraints. His posture was quite relaxed, actually, but she wasn't exactly surprised. She was in no shape to run or even attempt an escape.

The hallway they made their way through matched the aesthetic of her cell. Stone barriers surrounded her left and right, front and back. She could have sworn they grew narrower the further she got, but that could just be her nerves. She felt terribly light-headed, the anticipation of her fate boring down on her like an iron-heated brand.

"Keep your chin high, don't let them see that you're afraid."

Annabeth flicked her eyes around, careful not to move her head in case the guard escorting her hadn't heard the voice. It had probably come from one of the cells she was walking by. A demigod offering her feeble words of encouragement.

She saw no fault in obliging, though. She raised her hand and looked ahead, bringing her shoulders slightly back, straightening her posture. Whoever had said those words was right, she shouldn't allow Kronos the satisfaction of stealing her dignity as well as her freedom.

The guards rolled his eyes at her when they came to the end of the hallway. Annabeth was ashamed to say that she was panting slightly from exhaustion. The walk had taken not even ten minutes. She was severely out of shape. But it didn't matter, she told herself, she was going to die anyway.

"Right this way," the guard told her.

She stepped through the door, sighing when she realized she had to walk more. Was this her fate? To _walk_ herself to death?

The journey after that was kind of a blur in Annabeth's memory. She remembered it was a long distance they covered, but she lost herself in the monotonous effort of putting one foot in front of the other, zoning out into her own thoughts. The thought of her impending death was like a magnet attracting all of her attention, so that's what she both focused on and tried not to focus on the entire way to their destination.

It wasn't until the sunlight hit her face that she realized that her fate would be far worse than death.

She flinched when the harsh brightness shot into her irises, squeezing her eyes shut immediately, a hand jerking upward to shield herself. Her shoes no longer settled on hard stone, now it was something softer and warm... She blinked her eyes open to let them adjust and glanced downward. Sand?

Wait. The _sun_ was above her.

This wasn't the torture chamber.

When her vision had calmed, she spun around in a circle, her eyes widening in horror at the sight around her.

She was in an arena. Monsters and demigods who'd turned to Kronos's side encircled here in their seats, jeering and some being polite enough to throw leftover bones from their meals in her direction. She easily sidestepped those, her instincts rusty but not gone completely.

A public scene. Her death would be showcased to Kronos's forces, as if it was mere entertainment and not the snuffing out of a precious human life. It was cruel and inhuman. Annabeth involuntarily took a step back, priding herself on the fact that she didn't sink to her knees. This was so much worse than she could have ever imagined...

She eyed every individual she could make out, her heart thundering as she wondered which of them would be the one to kill her. An eyepatch told her where Ethan Nakamura was among the crowd. _Coward._ There were hellhounds chained against the bottom poles lining the bottom row of seats, hoards of Laestrygonians, Dracanae... and a boy.

Annabeth stared at him, her mouth parting slightly. She recognized him immediately. The boy who had somehow stopped Luke, herself, and Thalia from ending Kronos by lifting a single hand. Terror replaced the blood in her veins at the sight of him and she barely stopped herself from taking another step back.

The boy was sitting on a dark obsidian throne, reclining on it in a way that made it seem like he was _born_ to sit there, in that position of untold power. There was no crown atop his raven-black hair but Annabeth found herself thinking he didn't even need one.

A low groaning noise, like the creaking of a century-old gate swinging on his hinges, snapped her back to reality. The noise was exactly that, actually. She had been so focused on the crowd that she hadn't noticed the large iron gate standing erect on the opposite side of the large arena, almost two football-field's worth of distance away. They hissed and creaked as they parted to reveal a broad-shouldered human form.

The man had dark hair that was neatly trimmed into a short beard, his arms glowing with an almost golden light against the loose sleeves of his extravagant orange robes. Annabeth wouldn't have recognized him if it hadn't been for the wicked gleam of the scythe righted on the ground with his right hand.

Kronos.

Now Annabeth let herself stagger back, but she didn't make it more than three paces. The guard was suddenly at her back and pushed her back to her previous position. She stumbled, nearly falling over when the strangeness of her circumstances clicked in her head.

Luke was dead. Kronos had cast his body aside and assumed his true form once Thalia and Annabeth had made it outside of the Empire State Building. Annabeth should be dead by now from his mere presence.

Kronos must be doing what the Olympians often did while in mortal's presence. He was containing his power to himself so that Annabeth didn't burn to ashes from being this close to him. That meant he needed her for something.

Golden eyes settled on her and his face twisted in a sinister smile. A scream crawled its way to Annabeth's throat and she viciously bit down on her tongue, hard enough to draw blood, to keep herself quiet.

The last time she had seen those eyes had been on Luke. Their golden depths had been the focus of countless nightmares in the past few years. Nightmares where Luke mercilessly cut down Thalia, Grover, and everyone she had ever cared for, all with a twisted smirk on his lips.

Now, as she found herself unable to look away from them, she realized they had changed from a month ago. Possessing Luke's body had somehow given those eyes a human quality to them. That was all gone. They were... otherworldly, Annabeth decided was the best word for it. They betrayed the sheer power Kronos wielded, a power he could unleash upon her if she put one toe out of line.

"Annabeth Chase." Her name was spat at her like a taunt. It felt like one. "My, my, life hasn't been good to you these days, has it? You look dreadful."

The old Annabeth would have fired a quick retort in reply. She wasn't that person anymore. She simply held her tongue, knowing that his goal was to set her on edge. She wouldn't give him the gratification of showing that his efforts were succeeding.

Abruptly, she wondered why he was down here with her. Her gaze shot to the boy lounging on the throne, watching Kronos with a smile on his lips. _That's Kronos's throne_ , she thought numbly, eyeing the dark seat of power. This boy was sitting in Kronos's seat. And Kronos was _letting him_. Her fear of both of them only increased.

"You must be wondering why you're here and not being tortured to death," Kronos continued. The crowd's jeering grew silent, the audience practically leaning in to catch every word. "Pity, really, their screams were music to my ears." Annabeth gritted her teeth, clenching her jaw. "No, no... You have the opportunity to die in a more glorious way, a death befitting a hero. You should thank me, really, for granting you this mercy."

Annabeth made an oath right there and then that she would _never_ thank the titan Lord for _anything_.

"A gladiator." The words slipped from her mouth before she could stop herself. Kronos only smiled. Gods, she wanted to stab those horrible eyes out of their sockets.

"Very good, _Daughter of Athena_." Annabeth didn't miss his mocking tone. "Starting next week, you'll have the chance to prove your worth to us. The more you entertain us, the longer you live. Fail... it's straight to the torture chamber.'

"I'd rather die," Annabeth snapped, a flash of her old self peeking through. "Take me to the torture chamber right now for all I care. I will _never_ -"

"Not even for your new friend Hazel?"

Annabeth stilled, her mouth freezing in its open position. _Of course..._ She cursed herself for being so blind. There had been no reason to put Hazel in the cell next to her other than to force an interaction between them. Hazel was a sweet girl, Annabeth grudgingly admitted. Kronos had placed her there as leverage.

If Annabeth refused to cooperate, Hazel would die. An innocent life would be on her hands. A _human_ life.

"As long as you cooperate," Kronos drawled, taking a step forward. "Hazel lives. If you agree, I swear that she will never enter the chamber. I'll even sweeten the deal and have her brought hot food instead of stale bread. How does that sound?"

He was still making fun of her. He was phrasing it as if she had a choice in the matter. She didn't, her morals wouldn't allow for it, and he knew it.

Annabeth looked down at the ground, hating what her life had come to. If she ever came face-to-face with the Fates, she was going to strangle them.

Kronos chuckled, acknowledging her sign of defeat. "We have a new contestant."

The crowd's jeering and roars crescendoed once more. Each one felt like a separate dagger plunging its way to Annabeth's chest.

Her hands curled to fists at her sides. Kronos sneered and turned his back to her, his head angling upward to gaze at the boy on the throne. The boy's sea-green eyes flicked downward to meet the Titan Lord's eye-contact, a silent discussion held between the two that Annabeth wasn't privy to. Annabeth wasn't too focused on that, anyway.

Kronos's back was exposed.

She didn't have her knife.

But the guard who had escorted here did have a spear.

 _Easy as breathing_ , she told herself, remembering the disarming move Luke had taught her years ago. She spun around and grabbed the spear, using the length of it to bring the guard's neck down to meet her knee. His nose crashed into her joint with a sickening crunch, but she didn't give herself time to register it.

She took a step forward and hurled the spear with all her strength at Kronos's back. Had he been mortal, it would have gone straight through his heart, killing him instantaneously.

Kronos, with his heightened instincts and senses, spun around, fast as a striking snake, and caught the spear right before it hit his chest, applying pressure with his closed fist to snap it in two. Annabeth didn't care that her pitiful attempt on his life had failed. The fury boiling in his golden eyes was more than enough. She smiled with the knowledge that their entire audience had been witness to her effort.

The Titan Lord's glare was full of poorly-disguised hatred for her. His gaze shifted behind her and he gave a slight nod. Rough hands grabbed Annabeth's shoulders and jerked her to an arena exit. She walked out with her shoulders back and her head held high.

Her brief flutter of joy faded the moment the light around her vanished and she found herself back in the hallways of prison cells. One of them was Hazel's.

Death, she realized, would have been a mercy. Now an innocent life was hanging in the balance, its survival entirely dependent on the survival of someone who didn't even want to live anymore.


	3. Prison of Luxury

To Annabeth’s immense relief, she wasn’t thrown back into her prison cell.

To Annabeth’s immense  _ disgust,  _ she was escorted to a room befitting a queen.

It was exactly what she had expected a monarch’s bedroom to look like during the medieval ages. Her eyes gravitated to a large four-poster bed, delicate silk pillowcases and thick, no-doubt warm, blankets sprawled on top. She was only glad to see two things. 

The first was a window. She stared at the sunlight peeking through the pane of glass longingly, wishing she could bask in it freely like she had used to on the daily. She caught sight of a cluster of trees, greener than she remembered, swaying gently with an outside breeze. The window itself was locked, of course, but she was confident that she could get it open if she put her mind to it. 

The second was the bathroom. Its double doors opened to a bath  _ and  _ a shower, the only thing she was glad to see in this room. 

She walked over to it, swinging the doors open as she entered the bathroom, and turned the tap. She nearly moaned as her hands were instantly hit with running water. The least she could do for herself was make use of it. She took a moment to let her hand soak in the cool liquid, the water splashing over but not removing the number that had been tattooed there upon her arrival. 

_ No. 394.  _

The dresser that had been provided to her held a simple collection of clothes. One look at the bottom drawer had her slamming it shut. Like she was going to wear a  _ dress  _ of all things in this place. The upper two drawers had the style of shirts and shorts she was accustomed to wearing, thankfully. She selected a pair, making sure the shirt had long sleeves in case she found something useful to steal later on, and returned to the bathroom. The water’s temperature had increased now, the steam drifting over to blur the reflective surface of the large mirror over two sinks. She gratefully sunk into the bath and didn’t emerge until there wasn’t a speck of dirt left on her. 

She couldn’t believe she had taken such amenities for granted once upon a time. 

After getting dressed again, she sat on the bed. With nothing left to do, the precariousness of her situation set in once more. She grimaced, leaning back against the five pillows, staring up at the spinning fan hanging from the domed ceiling. A cool draft of air floated down to her, the sensation disturbingly foreign but pleasant; the air in her cell had been hot and humid. 

_ This is still a cell,  _ she reminded herself. It didn’t matter that she had a proper bed or bath now, it didn't matter that she could now change her clothes and sleep without listening to the screams of dying souls. It was just a ruse to lower her into a false sense of security, so that when she was thrust into the arena once more, in front of monsters and men alike, she would be caught off guard and wouldn’t know what to do. 

She had to remember her training from Camp. Her hand clenched the sheets, wishing they could hold the hilt of a dagger, or even a sword, instead. She suspected they wouldn’t give her one until she was fighting for their entertainment, and even then they might deny her a weapon. 

Not that one would make much of a difference, now that she thought about it. She was sorely out of practice and wasn’t in any shape to fight. The walk to the arena had told her enough. It would be a miracle if she could last even one fight. And it wasn’t like she could just let herself die on purpose, Kronos would be able to tell, and then Hazel would pray the price. 

Kronos had said her first fight would be in a week. The only thing she could think to do was get her strength back up. Maybe they would give her better, more nutritious meals now that she was one of the main sources of public entertainment.  _ Entertainment. _ She let out a harsh laugh, shaking her head in wonder. How had such a civilized world been brought to these barbaric settings?

At least her spirits were slightly higher than when she’d first received the information. Hurling that spear at Kronos had felt good,  _ liberating,  _ even if at the end he’d caught it before any damage could be done. Her mom would probably have smiled down on her upon seeing that. 

Annabeth hoped her mom was alright. After she and Thalia had made it away from Olympus and exited the Empire State Building, they had immediately been captured by Kronos’s forces. Everyone else had already been taken care of, the sheer size of Kronos’s army squandering any chances the demigods had at victory. The last any of them had heard of the Olympians, they were engaged in a deadly fight with Typhon. Annabeth shuddered to think of what might have happened to them. 

Someone knocked on the door. 

Annabeth was rather taken aback that they would have enough respect for her privacy to knock. Where were those manners during her stay in her prison of stone? She leapt off her bed, grateful for the chance to take her mind off of her future, and swung open the door. It wasn’t a servant or a guard like she’d expected. 

As soon as the door opened, she was met with the sight of blond hair and blue eyes. She froze, forgetting how to breathe, searching the face for any sign of a scar. There wasn’t one. It wasn’t Luke. In fact, now that she looked more carefully, she realized there was barely any resemblance between this boy and Luke other than the fact that they were both tall and muscular. 

“Hi…” the boy said awkwardly. Annabeth realized that her face had been set in a harsh glare and she immediately shifted it to a blank expression. “I’m not with Kronos, don’t worry. I’m like you.”

“A demigod?”

The boy nodded, noticeably more relaxed now that he realized Annabeth wasn’t going to attack him. “Yeah, but also… a contestant.” Annabeth pursed her lips, wishing she could eradicate that word from the English language. He took notice. “I’m sorry - I know what you’re feeling, I got thrown into the arena two weeks ago. Thalia went in on the second day.”

Annabeth perked up at the name. “Thalia’s here, too?” Oh thank the gods, she was alive! “Can I see her?”

“At dinner,” the boy said. The way he said dinner made it synonymous with hell. He didn't elaborate on it, though, so Annabeth was left guessing. “If you don’t mind me asking…” He scratched the back of his head awkwardly, biting his bottom lip. Annabeth noted the tiny scar he had on his chin. “... what did you do to get requested?”

Uh… requested? Annabeth furrowed her brows in confusion. “I’m not sure I get what you mean.”

“Someone specifically asked for you to fight in the arena,” the boy clarified. “Me - I’m Jason, by the way - Thalia, and Flynn were chosen at random, like cards out of a hat. Did you gain someone’s favor while you were in your cell or something?”

Annabeth squinted at him. “Gain someone’s favor?” She deflated slightly when she caught on to what he was saying. Instead of facing inescapable death, she now had a fighting chance. If she chose to see it that way, it was almost a mercy - a blessing in disguise. “Who requested me?”

Jason shrugged. “I don’t know. If you’re brave enough, you can probably ask at dinner - that’s in five minutes. Kronos is always there.”

_ What?  _

Annabeth wasn’t sure if she wanted to throw up or just flat out die on the spot. Eating dinner with Kronos was nowhere on her bucket list - she would rather  _ kick the bucket  _ than spend more than a millisecond around the guy than she had to. 

“I’d get back from dinner as early as possible if I were you,” Jason said grimly. “Flynn, the oldest out of all of us, has his first fight the day after tomorrow, you’ll probably need your strength before then, the matches are pretty hard to watch. Kronos and his men kidnapped him from his mortal family almost a week ago. Flynn had no idea he was a demigod before, then.” 

Annabeth winced. She didn’t need to be an Oracle of Delphi to guess how the fight the day after tomorrow would go. If Flynn didn’t know he was a demigod until a week ago, he probably didn’t have much skill in combat, if  _ any.  _ Throwing him into the arena was a death sentence. 

Jason’s expression reflected what Annabeth was thinking. There was a quiet sadness lingering on his face that made Annabeth wonder if Flynn would be just one of the many demigods Jason had seen die in the arena. “You know how to fight, right?” he asked softly. Annabeth nodded and his shoulders sagged with relief. “That’s good to hear. Come on, we should be heading to the dining room.” 

Annabeth grimaced and Jason laughed. Gods, it had been forever since she heard someone laugh. “I take it there’s no way I could just eat in here,” she said. Jason shook his head, smiling ruefully. He had probably attempted the same thing. 

Well, there didn’t seem like there was a way of getting out of this one. Annabeth shut her room door behind her, memorizing its location in case no one escorted her back, and followed Jason through yet another hallway. 

She briefly wondered when Kronos had had the time to construct all of this. Now that she thought about it, the arena had looked like it was built only recently. Then again, Kronos wielded formidable power as a Titan and could probably raise such a structure from the ground with half a thought. The same went for the prison she had been locked up in until today. 

Kronos was seated at the head of a long table with at least a dozen seats. Thalia, who shot Annabeth a look of startled surprise, and a boy with chestnut brown hair were seated near the middle, far from Kronos’ seat but not so much that it would offend him. 

Annabeth eyed the utensils on the table and grudgingly understood why Kronos insisted that they dine with him. She instantly singled out a sharp steak knife, a blade she could use as a lethal weapon if she so desired. Even a fork or a spoon could cause a lot of harm if used the right way. A simple guard might not have quick enough reflexes to stop her but a Titan Lord of Time undoubtedly did. And he probably liked having an opportunity to remind Annabeth and the others that they were under his power. 

Traces of the fury Annabeth had seen earlier in the arena hadn’t left the Titan’s eyes. He was glaring at her with the intensity of a thousand suns. The anger directed towards her couldn’t have been purely from her actions in the arena; she could see in his eyes that he  _ hated  _ her with all his being. 

Then it came to her. 

_ Luke.  _

Shame and guilt flooded her when she remembered how desperate he had looked when he showed up on her doorstep, only a few months before Kronos had taken possession of his body. He had practically  _ begged  _ her to help him. And she hadn’t. 

She wondered how different things would be now if she let him come into her house, sat him down, and at least  _ tried _ to forgive him. 

Kronos hated her because she had been the one chance Luke had at setting himself back on the right path. He would have lost his host if Annabeth had chosen differently. She had had more power over Luke than he had at that one moment. 

“Good evening, Ms. Chase,” Kronos said smoothly, no trace of emotion in his chilly voice. It sent shivers racing up Annabeth’s spine. “Mr. Grace, so kind of you to join us.” Annabeth restrained herself from rolling her eyes. As if they had a choice. 

Then she registered what he said.  _ Mr. Grace.  _ Annabeth’s mouth popped open of its own accord and her gaze shot to Thalia, who shrugged but for a nice change looked like she was fighting to hold back a smile.  _ Thalia had a brother? _

Kronos eyed her. “Have a seat.”

Annabeth’s fingernails sank deep into her palms. A little harder and she might have drawn blood. Gritting her teeth, she drew out a chair next to Thalia and sat down. There was already food on the table, she noticed. She hated how much her mouth watered at the scent of the roasted meat set down in front of her. It wasn’t a big portion, only a couple slices of roasted ham, but to her it might as well have been the embodiment of heaven. 

“You know, it’s good manners to thank a host for a meal,” Kronos said, his eyes glinting. 

“You’re right,” Annabeth said. “When I meet the mortal who was forced into preparing this, I’ll thank them profusely.” 

Kronos chuckled, leaning back against his seat. Annabeth bit the insides of her cheeks when she saw the handle of his scythe leaning against the arm of his chair, not far away from his hand. Kronos ran his thumb along its handle almost lovingly, savoring the feeling of the object representational of his power so close to him once more. Annabeth didn’t feel a single ounce of pity. “You would do well to at least  _ try  _ to win my favor, Ms. Chase. Who knows… If you overstep your boundaries, my hand just might slip-”

Annabeth felt time around her slow, her hand which had been reaching for her goblet of water meeting too much resistance to keep moving. She clenched her teeth, her heart pounding against her ribcage like a barrage of fired bullets.

“- during your first fight,” Kronos finished, taking pleasure in her startled expression. “It would be regrettable to have a contestant killed so early, but I just might make an exception. Of course, it wouldn’t satisfy the needs for entertainment for my army, so Hazel could pay the price, too.”

Annabeth’s eyes burned. The viscosity of the air around her lessened up. She held her breath as she tried to calm herself, to stop her thoughts from thinking of dozens of different ways she could make the Titan Lord suffer. 

_ Hazel, _ she reminded herself sternly. If not for herself, she needed to survive for Hazel. She thought of Nico di Angelo, who had been so broken after Bianca had perished during a quest. She hadn’t been there to witness it - she had been holding up the weight of the sky - but the aftermath had spoken volumes to her. If Nico lost another sister… 

“Well?” Kronos prompted. 

Thalia reached under the table for Annabeth’s hand. She gave it a gentle squeeze, showing Annabeth that she was there for her and wasn’t blind to her pain. Annabeth reluctantly returned the gesture. 

It was only earlier today that Annabeth had sworn she would never thank the Titan Lord for anything, even if her life depended on it. 

“Thank you,” she bit out, the words tasting like bile. 

Kronos smiled. Annabeth didn’t fail to notice how his hand moved away from his scythe. She released a breath she didn’t realize she was holding and let her fists unfurl.  _ Hazel, _ she repeated in her head, over and over like a chant. It was funny how a girl she barely knew could matter so much to her now. 

She tried reaching for the platter of meat but found that her appetite had vanished. Feeling defeated, she sank against the back of her seat, only at the last minute remembering to keep her back straight. Kronos could take away her freedom, her promises to herself, but he wasn’t going to take away her dignity or her morals. She wasn’t going to cower before him like the rest of the cowards who had defected from Camp Half-Blood. She was stronger than that. 

But even now she could feel her strength waning. She didn’t know how much longer she could even stand to be in his presence. Her stomach churned and nausea flooded the back of her throat. She felt like she was going to be sick if she had to spend another minute in this room. 

Thankfully, she didn’t have to. 

The doors opened soundlessly, two armed guards holding spears parallel to their bodies. Their armor covered enough of them so that Annabeth couldn’t identify if they were human or some other form of life. She was, however, able to make out the figure who strode in from between them. A human male, tall but not impressively so, with dark black hair and a similar-colored suit. Her forehead wrinkled in bewilderment at the neatly-done bow tie resting upon his collar. Scars crisscrossed across his face, stretching to his hairline and down into his stubble of a beard. Her skin began to itch, as if velcro was rubbing against it, and she knew without a doubt that this man was a Titan. A Titan who took great interest in human traditions, judging from his choice of attire. 

“Prometheus,” Kronos greeted, raising his goblet of wine. 

“I’ve come here to discuss the terms of our agreement,” Prometheus said. Kronos’s relaxed demeanor faltered slightly. 

“Surely this can wait,” Kronos frowned. 

“I will be making my departure tomorrow morning.” Prometheus flicked an invisible piece of dust off his suit, seemingly oblivious to Kronos’s growing irritation. “Atlas requires my assistance in China to negotiate for the mortals’ surrender. He’s never been good in that area.” Annabeth looked up, slightly taken aback that Kronos had already conquered land on the other side of the world in such a short amount of time. 

Kronos muttered a curse in Ancient Greek underneath his breath. “Very well. You’re dismissed for the night.”

It wasn’t until Thalia nudged Annabeth’s shoulder that she realized the Titan had directed the last phrase towards them. Flynn instantly hopped to his feet, practically fleeing from the room. Annabeth sighed. That kid wasn’t going to last more than five minutes in the fight the day after tomorrow. Thalia and Jason got up more gracefully but didn’t push in their chairs. 

Annabeth was the last to leave. She found herself grateful for the entrance of Prometheus, for Kronos’s attention was now off of her. She slid her dinner fork off the table and let it fall into her sleeve, shifting it so that it was leaning against her forearm. She got up, pushing her chair in so Kronos wouldn’t suspect her true reasons for being the last to leave, and walked out of the room without another word. Prometheus looked at her with a curious spark in his eyes but didn’t acknowledge her aside from that. 

She made it two steps outside before the doors shut with a click behind her. Locked. 

Thalia and Jason had been waiting for her, leaning against the wall adjacent to the door. Flynn had already run off. When Annabeth came into view, Thalia rushed forward and wrapped her in a warm, tight embrace. Annabeth yelped softly at the sudden contact but immediately hugged her back, closing her eyes contentedly. Jason grinned at her, looking a little awkward as he let his sister and her friend appreciate their reunion. 

“I’m so glad you’re okay,” Thalia breathed, finally releasing her. Annabeth felt like her ribs had been crushed. “You must have been in that cell for weeks, I wish I could have done something, I pleaded with Kronos to release you, even got on my knees-” Annabeth took a step back, despising the image of Thalia on her knees in front of the Titan Lord on her behalf, “-but he wouldn’t even consider it. Thank the gods for the person who requested you, I heard the guards talking about how it was your turn to die today.”

There was that word again.  _ Requested. _ Annabeth glanced back at the closed doors. Kronos couldn’t have requested her, he hated her guts. Prometheus probably didn’t even know her name. She hadn’t been particularly close with most of the demigods who’d defected to Kronos’ side during the war, and she doubted they even had that kind of influence with the Titan Lord. So who?

Maybe Prometheus would be curious enough to ask Kronos now that they were alone in the dining room. He had looked surprised when he saw Annabeth walking out, after all. 

“Oh, Annabeth,” Thalia sighed. “Don’t even think about it. You’re already on Kronos’ bad side, you can’t get caught  _ eavesdropping  _ on him, he’ll be furious! He threatened to sabotage your fight-”

Annabeth snorted. “I’m not actually going to do it, Thals, I have more common sense than that. I think I’m just going to take the long way back to my room, I need to stretch my legs after staying cramped in that cell.” Jason’s face flashed with sympathy. “I’ll catch up with you tomorrow, okay? I expect to hear everything.”

Thalia laughed a little. “Alright. I’m really glad you’re okay, Annabeth… Good night.”

“Night.”

Annabeth waved at them and set off in the opposite direction. Once she got to an intersection of hallways, she made a left turn and pressed her back against the wall, waiting for the sound of Thalia and Jason’s footsteps to fade completely. She took a deep breath and counted to twenty before swinging back around. 

_ I have more common sense than that. _ Annabeth snorted, hardly believing that Thalia had actually bought that lie. She tiptoed to the door and pressed her ear against it, straining to hear over the thumping of her rapid heartbeat. The voices were incredibly muffled as she had suspected they would be, but she could make out fragments of sentences.

“... tell me about the timeline. I know… created a new one. You went back in time, didn’t you?”

“Yes,” was the answer.

“In exchange… help this past year, you made… on the Styx that you would tell me about it. That boy is not supposed to… on your side in the other... He was supposed… hero-”

“That Percy Jackson does not exist anymore.”

Annabeth leaned in to hear more, but just then her limbs seized up. She cried out softly, trying to crane her neck to see who was doing this to her. The only thing she could make out was a shadow overlapping hers on the ground. 

Hot breath brushed against her ear, sending chills up her spine. She trembled as lips brushed against her skin. “You’re not supposed to be here,” the voice whispered. 

The hold over her vanished and she swung around to find herself face-to-face with the boy of her nightmares. 

“Care to tell me what on Earth you were thinking?” the boy prompted. Even without being perched on a throne, Annabeth’s knees still shook in his presence. His gaze was intense as the roaring sea, the power radiating off him so great that Annabeth felt like she should at least bow her head. The thought of that made her raise her chin even more, forcing herself to remain in eye-contact with him. Something sparked in his eyes at that.

“I-I was…” Annabeth faltered, realizing that she probably should have thought this through more. 

The boy rolled his eyes and held out his hand expectantly, jutting his chin towards her forearm. 

The metal of the fork felt scorching against Annabeth’s forearm and she paled, wondering how he could possibly have known that she had it in the first place. She glared at him and slid the utensil out of her sleeve, slapping it down hard in his grasp. He didn’t even flinch. 

“Why did you take it in the first place?” he asked casually. 

Annabeth looked away. He was probably enjoying this. He was probably going to laugh at her if she admitted that she just wanted to feel the outside air, the warmth of sunlight against her now undoubtedly ghostly pale skin. “I wanted to open my window.”

There was no trace of amusement or gratification in his green eyes. “I see.”

“Are you going to tell him?” Annabeth tilted her head towards the double doors, to Kronos. The boy followed her movement. 

“Why wouldn’t I?”

Annabeth flinched. Why had she been expecting a different answer? “He said he’ll kill Hazel.” 

The boy laughed. Annabeth was taken aback at how his whole face lit up when he did so. For a moment, she didn’t see the face of a monster, the face of Kronos’ equal, but the face of a regular teenage boy. She shook her head, shifting her train of thoughts back to where it was supposed to be. He was the enemy. He was as dangerous as Kronos, he shared his seat of power, and he probably wouldn’t hesitate to kill her in an instant.

“Luke told me you were smart,” he said. Annabeth’s head perked up. “Right now you’re falling a little short of my expectations.” Right. Annabeth shouldn’t have expected him to feel sympathy for either her or Hazel, much less care whether they lived to see the next sunrise or not. 

“Please,” was all she could think to say, her voice breaking a little. The thought of Hazel dying just because she’d made the reckless decision to listen in on Kronos and Prometheus’ conversation-

“A favor.”

“What?”

“He didn’t tell me you were hard of hearing,” the boy sighed. “A favor, Annabeth. I assume you know what that is.” Annabeth’s cheeks flamed. “You agree to owe me a favor, anything I ask, and I’ll forget about this little talk we had just now.”

“What kind of favor?”

“I guess you’ll just have to see.”

Annabeth bit her lip.  _ Hazel, Hazel, Hazel _ … “Fine.” 

“Wonderful,” the boy smirked, nodding to her before spinning around to head somewhere else. 

“Percy,” she found herself blurting out. 

The graceful strides paused and he angled his body to look at her, raising an eyebrow. “Annabeth,” he said dryly. 

“Who requested me?”

She wasn’t sure why she was asking or how she had gained the courage to do so. Maybe the somewhat civilized words she’d exchanged with him had made her lower her guard. She wouldn’t go as far to say she trusted him, but he was the most human being on Kronos’ side she’d met so far. She felt slightly more comfortable to him. And the fact that he hadn’t hurt her yet and gave her a chance to walk away - twice, she realized when she thought back to that night on Olympus - made her a little more hopeful. 

He didn’t look like he was going to say anything. 

“Did anyone else get requested?”

This time, he deigned to give her a response. “No,” he said. “You’re the only one, as far as I know.”

“Then who requested me?”

Percy shrugged. “Someone who wants to keep you alive, I suppose. You must have won someone’s favor.”

“But who-”

Percy scowled. Annabeth had gone too far. She sealed her lips, praying that was going to let it slide. “I wouldn’t open your window if I were you,” he said quietly. “Illusions are a weapon Kronos keeps in his arsenal at all times. None of it is real.”

Annabeth wasn’t sure how to respond to that. 

“Good night, Annabeth.”

Then he was gone. 


	4. Clashing Swords

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy New Year everyone!

Getting out of bed the next morning was a lot harder than Annabeth cared to admit.

It had nothing to do with the bed itself, of course. Last night's sleep had been the best rest she had achieved in months. Eight hours. It was a delightful change from the thin sleeping bags, couches, and stone floors she had become accustomed to. No, she didn't want to get out of bed today because she knew what they would force her to see.

That, and she knew, like always, there was nothing she could do to stop it.

She wished there was a way she could help Flynn. A noble part of herself considered begging Kronos to let her trade places with him. She even entertained the idea of getting on her knees to do so. The selfish and, regrettably, more influential part of herself was repulsed by the idea and decided against it. Yesterday, if Kronos had shown up at her cell and offered her death, she knew she would have felt nothing but everlasting gratitude.

The thought of that disturbed her now that she had come to her senses. It was disconcerting to think of how far she had fallen apart in confinement.

_ That won't happen again. _ She was going to live to see the day when Kronos had  _ everything _ taken away from him. And she prayed to the Fates that she would play a significant role in that. Nothing would make her happier.

All she had to do was get through today. And then tomorrow, and the day after, and who knew how many more after that.

But she would.

It started with getting past the fact that Flynn was going to die today.  _ Offering myself as a replacement for him today won't do anything _ , she told herself firmly. It was a pathetic way to reassure herself, she knew that, and an even worse excuse for her selfish line of thought, but right now it was all she had. Even if she went into the arena in Flynn's stead today, there was always the next fight - and then the next. Saving him today wouldn't mean a damn thing if he was just going to die a week later.

So, with difficulty, Annabeth stomached her guilt, forced her thoughts to the back of her mind along with her conscience, and allowed the guards waiting outside her door to escort her to the arena.

She kept her head down as they grabbed her roughly by the shoulders and pushed her forwards. It was a sign of submission and defeat, and that's exactly what they wanted to see. The further they went, the lighter their holds on her grew.

Her eyes darted to her left and right as she memorized the path from the arena to her rooms with ease. A few more days, maybe two, and she could have the entire layout of this area of Kronos's fortress memorized. Then she could use that information to form a plan of escape, eventually.

A hand, or claw, she couldn't make it out past the heavy armor - either way, it was sharp - tightened on her shoulder suddenly. Annabeth made a small whimpering noise as cutting nails dug into her flesh. She snapped her head around, schooling her face into a blank expression and furrowing her eyebrows.

"Oh, don't act all innocent," the guard told her. A female this time. "I can see you looking for a way to get out of this. I'll save you the trouble. You can't. There's no way of escape."

"I don't know what you're talking about," Annabeth said steadily.

The response earned her a harsh slap across her cheek.

Her head jerked back violently as metal armor met her delicate skin. A crack, loud enough to resemble the sound of lightning to her ears, reverberated through the tunnel-like halls. Her gums throbbed, torn from the impact with her teeth.

She glowered at the guard and pursed her lips, preventing herself from swallowing. Heat blanketed her tongue and affronted her mouth with the taste of metal. Blood.

_ Oh, perfect. _

She patiently waited until the guard was facing her again.

Then she spat directly into her face.

It earned her another slap across the face. But it was worth it, Annabeth told herself as she observed the guard's face reddening beneath yet redder. She had needed a mood boost before entering the arena. This was sufficient.

Or not. As it turned out, sitting in the stands was just as bad, if not worse, than being the focus of all the spectators. Being forced to watch a death was just cruel. 

She was grateful to at least find herself seated with Jason and Thalia, with Jason on her right and Thalia on his. Thalia's look was one of relief when she spotted Annabeth, Jason nudging her playfully on the shoulder in greeting. Annabeth flashed back a smile and allowed herself to draw comfort from their company. She let the roaring of the crowd drown out to a deafening buzz set apart from the world she paid mind to.

“Alright there, Annabeth?” Jason asked. “Your cheek is pretty red. Did someone hit you?” 

Annabeth quickly reclined that side of her face against her resting hand, feigning weariness. She carefully hid her wince, not wanting Jason to be more worried than he already was. “No, I just slept on the floor instead of the bed,” she lied. “Didn’t want to give them the satisfaction of seeing me accept their hospitality.” 

Jason nodded, looking like he believed her, and looked away. 

The familiar haunting groan of the gates sounded through the air and Flynn emerged from the shadows.

It was already off to a bad start. If this was a training exercise at Camp Half-Blood, Annabeth would have died of second-hand embarrassment. His armor wasn't strapped correctly, he was holding his sword all wrong, and his stance was just flat-out miserable. All his opponent would have to do was hit him, then he would fall on his sword and die instantaneously. The fight would be over in  _ seconds _ .

This was going to be harder to watch than she'd thought.

"They don't even have the decency to allow him not to embarrass himself," Jason muttered under his breath. "They know he’s never done this before… Hopefully he has some sort of ability of his own."

Annabeth turned back to Flynn. She hadn't thought of that. Then again, it was probably natural for someone like her. She didn't have any noteworthy abilities other than that she was intelligent. Special powers had never been a big deal to her, unless they were something she could incorporate into a battle strategy. She'd long since accepted she would never be like her friends - her strengths lay elsewhere, in the world of wits and cleverness.

Thalia could summon lightning, Jason could probably do the same, Nico could raise the dead from the ground... Maybe,  _ hopefully _ , Flynn could do something along those lines. It would give him a fighting chance. A slim one, since he wouldn’t know how to control it, but still a chance.

Kronos was seated on his throne once more. Percy was nowhere to be seen. It relieved Annabeth to see that. She would never admit it to anyone but herself, but the raven-haired boy scared her half to death. She had dwelled on the favor she now owed him for hours on end last night. Nothing he asked could bode well for her.

"Flynn, son of Ares," Kronos drawled.

Annabeth let out a cautious breath. Children of Ares were generally gifted in combat. Clarisse was perhaps the best fighter Annabeth knew, other than Luke. Hopefully, Flynn wasn't the exception.

"You have the opportunity to choose your first opponent. Before you, on the ground, there are three objects, each belonging to a different warrior. You are free to choose anyone you wish."

Annabeth squinted, sitting taller, to make out the items positioned by Flynn's feet. She felt Jason and Thalia doing the same beside her. A necklace, a crossbow... and a pen?

She did a double-take. 

Flynn didn't go for it like she would have done. He stooped down and instead laced the necklace between his fingers. Out of the corner of her eye, Annabeth saw a demigod with wicked black armor in the crowd slouch back, visibly disappointed when Flynn's hand brushed the crossbow but didn't pick it up.

Excellent decision on the necklace, Annabeth thought. She didn't think she could handle watching a demigod kill another demigod. Not right now. Or ever.

As Flynn held the necklace up, a triumphant smile flitted across his lips.

His opponent rose to his feet in the crowd.

Annabeth's heart dropped.

The Minotaur.

Wet nostrils flared as the beast made its way down the steps and through the gates. It snarled at Flynn, who looked close to wetting his pants. The beast twirled a gleaming double-bladed ax in its hand, crusted blood embroidering the edges of it. The light caught the dozens of necklaces hanging around its chest, much like the one Flynn carried in his hand. With a growing feeling of horror, Annabeth recognized those as the beaded necklaces campers got when they survived another year.

Her hands curled into fists at her side, her vision darkening to red. She seriously reconsidered her decision to not ask if she could trade places with Flynn, if only so she could kill the Minotaur herself.

Flynn went white, stammering something she couldn't catch from the distance that separated them. It was probably a plea for mercy or a change of opponent if Kronos' growing smirk was anything to go by - one that wouldn't be granted.

"Can't we do something?" Annabeth heard herself whisper to Jason and Thalia, even though she knew it was hopeless. Thalia glanced at her, eyes sunken and dreary. This wasn't the first time she had seen a demigod go out this way, Annabeth realized, and it wouldn't be the last.

"I've tried, believe me," Thalia said flatly. "I think you heard her screams one of those nights in the torture chamber."

Annabeth's mouth went dry. They had given a demigod a slow death purely because Thalia had tried to save them?

She glanced back at Flynn, her strength waning. She had been wrong, so terribly wrong before - there was no way she could bear to watch this. She squeezed her hands on the bench to ground herself as her head grew impossibly dizzy.

_ There isn't anything I can do. _

Just like when Zoe had died, when that cyclops had nearly killed Thalia, when Kronos had killed Luke and burnt him to nothing but ash.

Jason made a small noise in the back of his throat, resembling that of an injured animal. His hands were clenching the stone seats they were sitting on - a mirror image of what Annabeth was doing - so hard that she wasn't sure what would be the first to crack, his knuckles or the stone itself.

She closed her eyes as the Minotaur charged forward.

"Open them," a voice urged by her ear.

She slid them open, not sure why she was listening to them or who was speaking.

Just in time to see the Minotaur swing down its ax.

Its pupils darkened, irises turning glittering black, muscles and bulk tensing as it brought the blade down hard.

Flynn tripped over himself as he tried to scramble away.

Annabeth sucked in a breath-

And nearly screamed when she watched the Minotaur's blade make direct contact with Flynn's leg, hard and vicious enough to sever the entire limb off.

Flynn roared with pain, eyes rolling to the back of his head as his consciousness threatened to slip away. Annabeth wished it would, if only so he could escape the pain that he was feeling. This wasn't a fight - this was what a butcher would do to a piece of meat. There was no honor on this battlefield. 

Fate, cruel as ever, did not spare Flynn from the agony, and he regained his bearings not a moment later. Despite being a son of Ares, the God of War himself, there was nothing he could to win this fight.

Tears leaked from his eyes, spilling down and dripping to the floor without an end in sight. They shone clear in the light for a moment before hitting the ground, instantly becoming enveloped by the recently formed lake of blood that soaked his clothes, staining them red.

The Minotaur didn't stop there.

With another swing, another ferocious and bloodcurdling roar from the audience, another leg went away. Flynn's shrieks rebounded off the walls, loud enough for the entire world to hear. His eyes were crazed, his mouth stained with pooling blood. He spluttered, choking on his own insides, too weak to spit it out or tilt his head so it would drain out.

He was going to die by choking on his own blood.

Annabeth said something to Jason, something along the lines of  _ I can't watch this anymore _ before she suddenly tore past the crowd of onlookers to just  _ get away _ from the brutality eighty meters away. Only three hands reached out to stop her, the others too distracted by Flynn screaming his guts out. She dodged them with ease.

She didn't stop running until the roars of laughter faded away. A gasp forced itself out of her and she doubled over, looking up to find herself in a corridor she didn't remember walking through before. The walls were made of marble, the surfaces cold through the holes in her worn-out shoes. It was well lit, different from the dim hallways they had led her through yesterday evening.

She took a moment to look around, observing the perfectly polished floors and walls, how there wasn't a single speck of dirt in sight.

Then she doubled over and threw her guts up onto the floor.

She leaned her weight against a wall, coughing as her chest squeezed in on itself as she hurled out everything she had. An image came to her mind. One of Flynn's leg several feet away from the rest of his body, of blood bubbling up a mouth that couldn't even get out a scream-

Annabeth bent over again, eyes watering with the fire burning in her throat as she tried to swallow afterward.

As luck would have it, a shadow emerged, darkening the white marble that she had kept her eyes on. She lifted her eyes slightly, panting as a wave of nausea washed over her. She swayed slightly as she recognized the man who had interrupted Kronos' dinner last night.

"Are you alright, child?" Prometheus asked, a slight frown creasing his forehead. He was still dressed in that pathetic black suit of his. Annabeth wanted to wring that stupid bowtie from his neck.

When she didn't respond, Prometheus reached into the front pocket of his suit with the grace of a civilized man and drew out a clean white handkerchief.

Annabeth couldn't hold back a derisive snort. She fought past the embarrassment reddening her ears at being found in this state and snatched it from his grip. The only time she would ever accept something from him.

Prometheus had the wisdom to say nothing as Annabeth wiped her mouth, then her chin. His gaze never left her, though. He had a careful expression, almost as if he was assessing her on the spot. She remembered him giving her a similar look last night.

"What?" Annabeth demanded. "I'm well aware of how pathetic I look, thank you very-"

Prometheus silenced her with a small smile. "The first time is never easy," he said somewhat sympathetically. "I know it doesn't mean much coming from someone like me, but it gets more bearable after time."

"You're telling me you don't enjoy watching them?"

Prometheus looked faintly offended at the suggestion but didn't give her a response. She wasn't sure what to take away from that.

Annabeth looked again at his suit, the way he held himself - the look he was still giving her. Was that sympathy? She nearly laughed before realizing that it might be genuine. 

Prometheus was the most civilized of all the Titans she'd met so far. Nothing like Atlas or Kronos. He was the first one who didn't blatantly dismiss human beings as mere ants beneath his immortal boot; he observed them, learned from their mannerisms as if they were worth his time.

"Weren't you supposed to be gone by this morning?" she asked. Again, he smiled at her. "Get some demigods in Asia to surrender to a psychotic, bloodthirsty tyrant, something like that?"

"I was," Prometheus agreed. "But I managed to convince Kronos that his methods were needed more than mine. He will leave in a few hours, I believe."

"You're dooming the demigods there to a lot of suffering. Suffering that could be prevented - by you. You're okay with that, with leaving them to that fate?"

"I am."

There was something in his voice that made Annabeth pause. It wasn't just the casual, uncaring way he agreed with her, it was the tone hidden behind the statement. She narrowed her eyes.

Prometheus had come to Thalia during the Battle of Manhattan to persuade her to surrender. Asia was only a few minutes - maybe even seconds - away for someone who wielded his kind of power. Why not give them the same treatment as he had with Thalia?

"You want to be here," she said finally. "Why? What’s so important that you can't leave even for a few days..." She stopped, thinking harder. "You sent Kronos away for a reason. Why?"

"Very good," Prometheus praised. Annabeth bristled, even though there wasn't a hint of condescension in his tone. "Luke told me you were smart."

"Percy said the same thing yesterday."

Curiously, Prometheus grew still. A shadow passed over his face. Subconsciously, she took a step forward, not sure what she was going to do after but words already on the tip of her tongue-

"You despise Luke for what he did," he said finally.

"I do."

The answer came easier to her now. An answer she wouldn't have let herself even think about a few months ago. Back when she had been blinded by how much she had cared for her old friend, even after everything he'd done to her.

"I wouldn't judge him so harshly if I were you," Prometheus said as if he could read her thoughts. His body turned to angle itself away. "After all, he is the only reason you're alive right now."

"Kronos will kill me soon enough," Annabeth said dismissively. "This is just his way of making it as slow as possible. He just wants to - to break me. That's just what he does, he-"

Prometheus was already shaking his head. "No. I'm sure that's what he's convinced himself he's doing, but if it were up to him, you would have been dead the moment he escaped Luke Castellan's body."

Annabeth frowned. "Then that means..."

"Someone else is looking out for you," Prometheus finished. "Luke cared for you, you know, I’m not surprised that he would have wanted you kept safe when Kronos took over. I just hope that when the time comes, you'll pay that favor back."

With that, he put his back toward her, flicking his hands carelessly, and proceeded down the hall.

"By the way," he called over his shoulder. "I would eat as much as you can at dinner tonight. Get your strength up. Now that Flynn's turn is up, you're up next for the arena. A week, as Kronos told you yesterday."

Annabeth's head shot up, but by the time she did so, he was gone. So was the vomit.

So were the screams and roars coming from the arena.

Flynn was dead.

And she was next.

xXx

Her summons to fight in the arena didn't come for any days. She didn't remember how many - they all blurred together after a while. They were all the same. She woke up, ate, forced herself through a conversation with Jason and Thalia, ate, lay down, and sulked in her room, ate, and then slept. A productive routine.

She wasn't allowed a weapon, of course, so there wasn't any way for her to practice for her upcoming battle. Prometheus had taken over the dinners in Kronos' absence and, keeping her more amicable conversations with him in mind, she had repeatedly requested something to practice with. A wooden staff, a sword - both of which she wasn't exactly proficient with, so she wouldn't present herself as a threat - but the answer was always a solid and unyielding  _ no _ .

Thalia and Jason never spoke up on her behalf during these talks. Annabeth suspected they had taken up a similar argument back when they were fresh to this lifestyle but had ultimately given up. Prometheus never paid them much attention, anyway. His focus was usually on her.

There wasn't much to do nowadays, so Annabeth constantly thought over everything Prometheus had revealed to her. He didn't seem like he was the biggest fan of Kronos either, which perhaps was something Annabeth could have exploited if she was smarter. Her mother would have been able to manipulate him to her needs. He wouldn't see her coming. He would, on the other hand, see Annabeth coming from miles away. So that path led to a dead end.

That was usually as far as her train of thought would speed along - there wasn't much to go on. All her guesses on why he'd insisted that Kronos leave the fortress to give support to Atlas in person ended up nowhere, leaving her more frustrated than before.

Thalia and Jason didn't seem to care that much. That was something Annabeth grew to notice the more time she spent with them, especially Thalia. The first few times she spotted it, she tried to convince herself that it was just the overall depressing vibe of the place getting to her. But it kept presenting itself, clear as day, to where Annabeth couldn't ignore it even if she wanted to.

It was the most obvious in their eyes. Thalia’s eyes used to be this beautiful shade of electric blue that Annabeth had always been jealous of, longing for something other than her own stony gray. Jason's were the same.

Their eyes were still blue, of course, but something behind them had changed.  _ No, not changed necessarily _ , Annabeth amended as she stared at them across the dinner table one night. Broken.

She knew that look well enough.

Her father had always been a huge geek of military history, which predictably led to many late nights of watching documentaries or historically-based films with him when Annabeth was younger. She vividly recalled montages and clips of prisoners of war, their faces bloodied and bruised, the camera lens somehow able to capture the lifeless quality blooming in their eyes. The same she saw in Jason and Thalia.

They needed to get out of here.

Just as she had calculated, she had the layout of the floor the demigod contestants - three now - dwelled on fully memorized within the matter of a day. And she hadn't stopped there. Annabeth had observed the rotation of the guard, which guards slacked off more than others, how those shifts were altered when there was a change to the day like rain or a loose prisoner (which had happened only once so far).

That was the good news.

The bad news was that none of it did her any good.

As far as she could tell, there wasn't any way to escape. The place was fortified too well.

And now she had two days to go until her first fight.


	5. Mirrored Eyes

**|| The morning of Flynn’s death ||**

“Who is the leader?”

“What?” 

Grover kicked out against the ropes binding him to the iron-backed chair, gasping aloud when he felt something pop. Prometheus didn’t seem to notice, merely folding his arms and leaning against the nearest wall. 

“Who,” Prometheus repeated, enunciating his words more than necessary this time, “is the leader?”

“I  _ know _ what you said,” Grover grumbled, trying his luck with the arm restraints now. No good. “I don’t get  _ what _ you’re saying, though. The leader of  _ what _ ? The leader around here I assume is Kronos, but that’s all I got for you.”

“So you’ve never heard of a resistance.”

Grover’s eyes flicked up. He paused in his futile efforts to escape, trying to fight back a smile.  _ A resistance?  _ Interesting. Prometheus’s eyes narrowed and Grover hastily blanked his expression. “No,” he said. “You telling me right now is the first I’ve heard of it.”

“Is that so…”

“Up until today, I was in a prison cell,” Grover pointed out helpfully. “I wouldn’t have heard anything.”

“I’m glad to hear that.”

Prometheus approached him and with a flick of his fingertips the restraints fell away. Grover’s hands immediately went to their opposite wrists. He winced at the rawness wrapping around them like startling cuffs of red. The Titan gave him a few seconds to compose himself before grasping his shoulder and leading him out of the room. 

“Where are you taking me?” Grover asked.

“Quiet.”

A cacophony of deafening roars streamed through the walls. Grover’s sensitive ears rang loudly against the noise. He felt Prometheus’s gaze burn into his neck. A faint buzz lilted the air around him. Grover’s skin began to itch with the presence of magic. Suddenly the pain lifted and he couldn’t hear the commotion anymore. 

Grover risked a glance over his shoulder, eyeing the Titan cautiously. Prometheus acted like he didn’t notice. 

“Thank you,” Grover said anyway. 

“Don’t thank me yet.”

Grover frowned at him before turning to face forwards again. They were nearing a large, ornate door painted a dark shade of red. A pungent, almost metallic scent hung thick in the air. Loud, piercing screams cracked through the silence Prometheus had been providing him and he clamped his hands over his ears in a hurry. Prometheus swore silently under his breath, something in a language Grover couldn’t understand. 

“What was that?” Grover asked.

“Screaming.”

“Well, no sh-”

“Quiet.”

Prometheus leaned forward and pressed his ear against the door. He wasn’t pleased with what he heard, judging from the scowl he assumed. Grover made a mental resolution to not speak for the next few minutes unless it was absolutely necessary; he didn’t want to risk the Titan’s anger. Not when Prometheus was in this state.

He almost looked  _ nervous _ . 

A deep breath slipped from the Titan. His hand was steady, forcefully so, as he raised his hand to knock three times fast and one time slow on the elegant red door. “Come in!” came a muffled voice. Grover backed up a step as Prometheus swung open the door, his face completely void of emotion. 

Kronos was behind the door, grinning at something a boy to his right had just said. It faded away slightly when he realized who was at the entrance to the room, his golden eyes sharpening with suspicion. Grover peered inside, his nerves fluttering when he eyed the dozens of celestial bronze weapons hanging from the walls. A chandelier hung from the high ceiling, glowing with soft yellow light from the candles delicately placed on it. It hovered above a round table with five chairs. A spread of papers was sprawled on its surface, filled with handwriting and intricate drawings. If Grover had to guess, they were maps of different locations all over the world. 

He knew what this was. A war room. There was one back at Camp Half-Blood…  _ had been  _ one back at Camp Half-Blood. There had been fewer weapons by far and it didn’t look this threatening, but the idea was the same. 

“I thought you would have left by now,” Prometheus said casually. 

“I was just about to make my departure,” Kronos replied. “Percy and I were just finishing up. Is there something you wanted to say to me before I left?” Grover shuddered at the tone of his voice. Like smooth velvet blanketing a sharpened dagger, sending uncomfortable quivers down his spine. There was no hint of friendliness in his voice, nor any sense of camaraderie. 

“I actually wanted to speak with Percy.”

The boy looked up. 

“In that case, I’ll leave you two…  _ three _ ,” he corrected himself, eyeing Grover curiously, “alone. I’ll return soon, Percy.” He didn’t notice Prometheus flinching, but Percy did. His green eyes narrowed. A blink and the suspicion was gone, replaced by a friendly grin as he turned his attention to Kronos. 

“Doubt it,” Percy replied teasingly. “Without me, they’ll beat you on the first day.”

“You’re modest as ever, Percy.”

“My apologies. The third day is much more realistic.”

Kronos sighed exasperatedly but was plainly fighting a smile. Grover watched on, bewildered. “I’m starting to  _ wish  _ I don’t make it back.” The boy laughed. “Take care of yourself while I’m gone.”

“Of course.”

Kronos gave Percy a friendly pat on the shoulder before his form began to pulsate with a golden light. Percy and Grover averted their eyes. The Titan Lord was gone in a flash of blinding light. 

Prometheus relaxed next to Grover.

“It’s been a long time,” Percy said after a moment of uneasy silence. He folded his arms and reclined against the table. He didn’t offer anything after that, but his cocked eyebrow showed he was waiting for Prometheus to speak up. Grover listened to their interaction carefully. 

“It has,” Prometheus said, his words soft and smooth. “Ever since I returned from the battle for Olympus, it’s almost as if you’ve been avoiding me like the plague. I wonder if there’s a reason for this behavior? Surely I have done no wrong to you so far.”

The corners of Percy’s lips twitched upward.

“Or is it Kronos who has instructed you to stay away from me?”

“Paranoia doesn’t look good on you, Uncle.”

Grover frowned.  _ Uncle?  _

“I would chalk it up to circumstance and nothing more,” Percy continued, his expression never once shifting. Grover thought he sounded sincere, but as far as he knew it was all an act. Kronos was an incredibly skilled liar, seductive with his false promises of power. You didn’t have to look any further than Luke Castellan. Kronos could have passed on that talent. “It’s good to see you,  _ truly _ . What can I do for you?”

Prometheus sighed. “Why do you always assume that I want something from you?”

“Are you going to deny it?”

“No, not this time. I wanted to ask you for a favor. This is Grover Underwood. He’s a satyr.”

“I can see that, funnily enough.”

“He’s going to be your companion from now on,” Prometheus said. 

“ _ What _ ?” both boys said at the same time. Grover glanced uneasily at Percy, who was looking like he had just been told that he was going to die tomorrow. Blood rushed to Grover’s face and he shrunk in on himself, only at the last second stopping himself from backing out of the room even more. 

Prometheus ignored them both. “Grover will accompany you starting today. He will assist you with your daily duties-”

“I will  _ not _ ,” Grover protested. “I’m not a serving boy.”

“ _ You  _ don’t have a choice,” Prometheus snapped. 

“This doesn’t sound like a favor to me, Uncle,” Percy said.

“The favor isn’t for me.”

Curiously, the arrogant, uncaring facade slipped for a beat. Percy’s arms unfolded themselves, bracing his body on the table. He looked away. 

Prometheus seemed to realize that he had said something wrong. Confusion blossomed on his face before morphing into something else entirely. Grover could practically see the wheels in the Titan’s head turning as he considered the boy in front of him, who was looking as if the world had vanished from beneath his feet. Percy was stone still, but Grover could easily hear his poorly regulated, heavy breaths and he suspected Prometheus could, too.

“I didn’t mean that,” Prometheus said quickly, almost desperately. The calculating glint in his eyes was completely gone. Concern now blanketed his voice with something almost frantic, but Percy didn’t look like he cared. If anything, it seemed to make him even angrier. “Forgive me-”

“The satyr can stay,” Percy said flatly, having regained control of himself. “You’re right, I do owe someone a favor, how incredibly kind of you to remind me. It will  _ really  _ please me to have a reminder of the reason  _ why _ I owe that favor around me at all hours of the day, thank you  _ so much _ .”

“Percy, I only-”

“With respect, I’d like to request that you leave. I think we can finish this conversation up another day, Uncle, we have no shortage of free time now that the war is near its end.” 

Prometheus didn’t look like he was going to budge even an inch. 

“Fine,” Percy said. He turned to Grover at last. “Come on, satyr.” Without waiting for a response or a sign of compliance, he walked past Prometheus to exit the room. Grover felt the tension fade not even two seconds after his untimely departure. He spared a glance at Prometheus and was surprised that he wasn’t displaying even a hint of anger.

Instead, he looked… sad. There was sorrow the likes of which Grover knew he would never be able to empathize with in his eyes. Grover was aware how feelings and emotion didn’t come as easily to immortals as mortals. Immortals had been weathered down by time, one flicker of grief lost in the grand scheme of things. What was one loved one when you could have a hundred more? You had forever to get over them. 

This wasn’t like that. This was pure, genuine misery; an open wound that even a millenium couldn’t heal. 

“What do you want with me?” Grover found the courage to ask. He knew Prometheus’s character, or at least what Chiron had taught him about the Titan. Prometheus had never been one for brute strength, instead favoring cunning and wits to secure his victories. He could perhaps give Athena a run for her money - he had centuries of experience over her. 

There was something else at work here, and Grover was sure he wasn’t going to like whatever it was. But he knew for a fact that Percy was at the center of it. Prometheus was playing some sort of game and Grover was one of the many pawns he was positioning. Unfortunately for him, he wouldn’t be able to see the endgame until the game was over. And pawns being pawns, he might not even  _ live _ to see how it all played out. His life was completely in Prometheus’s hands. 

He wondered who else’s was. 

“Why hand me over to him?” he continued. 

Prometheus looked at him. His mouth opened and for a second Grover thought he was going to give him an answer. Then the Titan seemed to think better of it and turned to leave. Grover thought it was strange how he was just left alone like that, he could easily run away, couldn’t he? 

The guards at the end of the hallway told him differently.

So, with nothing better to do, Grover went to find Percy. 

He found him sitting in a courtyard. The guards eyed Grover uneasily but let him pass, estimating his chances of escape to be extremely low no doubt.

The sun was setting, staining the cloudless sky shades of orange and rose. Grover could distinguish the faint outline of the moon from the many hues. A full moon tonight, apparently. Stars twinkled at him, taunting him with the idea of freedom and peace. He forced himself to look back down. 

A soft breeze picked up, blowing against his dirty skin. He exhaled softly, his eyes fluttering closed for a minute. If he thought hard enough, he could almost imagine he was back at Camp, sitting in the strawberry fields with his pipes, playing a beautiful melody for himself and anyone who chose to listen. 

_ Almost _ . Unfortunately, the image fell away immediately after it formed. 

The courtyard was exquisite: a collection of elegant, perfectly-polished white structures that went on for miles. Rows of pillars were positioned to form a grid with wide squares, the columns reaching around five times Grover’s height, maybe more. Tendrils and sprigs of ivy crawled up them, the green radiating an ethereal light that couldn’t possibly be naturally occuring. Magic, then. 

Tiles of an identical color decorated the floor, not a fault or a crack in any of them. They receded around a small waterfall cascading down from a garden pavilion with a green roof off into the distance. The water made its course past dozens of shaved-down rocks, breaking off into small streams that worked through small patches of flowers and columns. They eventually all came together, joining in the center of the courtyard around the most beautiful fountain Grover had ever laid eyes on. 

Percy was sitting on the rim, his feet dipped in the water. Grover noticed he hadn’t taken off his shoes. He tentatively took a few steps closer. Then, summoning every ounce of bravery he possessed, forged on until he was right at Percy’s side. Percy didn’t look at him, his head hung low as he kept his eyes on the water. 

“Are you okay?” Grover didn’t know why he cared, but he felt obligated to ask anyway. 

Percy’s head shot up. His eyes were full of terror but when he saw that it was only Grover, he visibly relaxed, his posture slumping. He returned his gaze to the water, transfixed. “Did Prometheus send you?”

Grover frowned. “Uh, no. Did you have some sort of…” He searched for the right word. “... disagreement? You didn’t look happy to see him.”

A humorless laugh. “You could say that.” Grover waited for him to elaborate, but he didn’t. 

“Did Kronos tell you not to talk to him?”

He was going too far, he knew that. Unfortunately, Grover had always had a big mouth. Percy looked up again, faintly taken aback by the question. “No,” he said anyway. “No, he didn’t. It’s just uh… personal. Something that happened back when I was younger.” He kicked at the water, giving Grover the impression of an upset toddler for a brief moment. 

“Oh.” Grover paused, not sure what to say. “Er - do you want to talk about it?”

“No.”

“Would it be okay if I asked you who you owed a favor?”

“No.”

“Okay…”

Percy blew out a breath through his mouth before getting to his feet. Belatedly, Grover noticed that his shoes weren’t wet. He had a suspicion about that, but Percy spoke before he got the chance to ask. “What’s your name?”

“Grover,” he said. “Underwood. You’re Percy.”

“Yeah. No last name that I know of, unfortunately.”

“Oh.”

Percy shifted uncomfortably. Grover wondered how long it had been since he talked with someone his age. “So Prometheus got you out of your cell this morning?” At Grover’s nod, he pursed his lips. “Have you had anything to eat yet?” 

It was Grover’s turn to be taken aback. “I’m sorry?”

“Have you had anything to eat yet?” Percy repeated, emphasizing his words the same way Prometheus had done during Grover’s interrogation. “That prison food is nasty stuff.”

“No,” Grover said carefully. “I haven’t, actually. Why?”

Percy hopped off the ridge of the fountain, smiling at the water like he was remembering something. A distant memory. “Come on, let’s get something for you. On a scale of one to ten, how hungry are you?”

“A twelve.”

Time passed quickly after that. Later that day, Percy had given Grover all the food he asked for (which had been a whole feast’s worth). He showed Grover to a room in his wing of the… wherever they were. Kronos’s fortress? The next afternoon, he dropped by and asked Grover how he was doing. His hands were covered in blood he had been too tired to wipe away. Grover didn’t want to know and Percy didn’t want to explain, so they didn’t speak of it then.

Slowly, Grover got used to the whole routine. Visits from Percy became a part of his day, as normal as breakfast, lunch, dinner, and second dinner. When Prometheus announced that he would be Percy’s “companion”, Grover thought he would be something like a servant, forced into assisting Percy with whatever he needed, however unpleasant those tasks may be. But Percy never asked for his help with anything. All he did was sit down and talk with him. The topics varied from Grover’s old school to something as simple as the shapes of clouds. 

Grover didn’t know how, but somehow it became easy to be around Percy. He was just like any other kid Grover might have met before Kronos’s reign began… but at the same time he wasn’t. Kids had always shied away from Grover in the past, even some campers on occasion. He knew he hadn’t contributed very much back then - he couldn’t fight and, according to the Council of Cloven Elders, he didn’t even deserve his searcher’s license. He wasn’t worth their time.

But Percy never judged him for what he said. Heck, he even looked  _ interested  _ in everything he had to say, no matter how trivial their topic was. There were times when he could forget everything Percy had done for Kronos, all the lives he had probably taken to please a psychopathic Titan. 

“Why don’t you take me with you?” Grover had asked Percy one day as he munched on a sandwich. They had both been sprawled on Grover’s carpet, an empty pizza box already discarded to their left. He never knew where Percy got the pizza from. 

“Take you where with me?” Percy had mumbled through his mouthful of food. 

“Wherever you get your hands bloody.”

Percy had slowly lowered his sandwich, gazing at Grover beneath his long lashes. “You’re too soft.” He had said it matter-of-factly. Maybe that’s what cushioned the blow, because Grover hadn’t felt offended. “I see the look on your face whenever I have… whenever my hands are dirty. It disturbs you. How do you think you’ll feel when you see where it came from?”

After that, they dropped the subject and resumed their silent agreement to never speak of it. 

It could be worse, Grover conceded. He’d heard the subjects of torture down in the torture chamber while he’d been in lockup. Compared to them, he had it easy, he was practically in Elysium. Well, he wouldn’t go that far. The nicer part of the Fields of Asphodel was more like it… if there was a nice part. 

He noticed, though, that Percy was careful not to talk about himself or his past. Apart from revealing that he didn’t know his last name, Grover knew little to nothing about the guy. He didn’t even know where his room was, despite being in the same wing. All the tidbits of information he’d had to gather from himself. He’d never seen Percy in action, but he guessed that he wielded tremendous power. Kronos obviously respected him and held him in high regard, the guards trembled in fear when they passed him - Grover was honestly glad that he was on Percy’s good side. At least, he hoped he was. 

There were other things he’d learned. Percy, like all demigods, couldn’t read. He didn’t remember his mom and if he knew who his father was he didn’t tell Grover, though Grover had his suspicions. He asked why Percy called Prometheus  _ Uncle  _ and Percy said it was because they used to be really close when he was younger. That was all he said on the matter.

Six days passed before Grover finally forced himself to ask the question. 

“Hey, Perce?”

“Hmm?” Percy looked up from the maps he was studying, frowning slightly when he met Grover’s stare. Grover never left his room unless it was with Percy; he didn’t want to risk any of the guards jumping him for their own entertainment. But today, Grover had come here all alone, to the war room where Percy was studying papers written in Ancient Greek. If Grover had to guess, they were reports from Kronos.

“Can I ask you a question?”

Percy lounged on the chair he was seated in, placing his shoes on the table. “Sure.”

“Did… any of my friends,” Grover swallowed, his heart pattering nervously. “Are any of my friends alive?” 

“Depends. Which friends in particular?”

Grover considered. Several names popped into his head. He decided on the first one. “Annabeth Chase.”

Percy’s reaction to her name was bizarre. He closed his eyes for a moment, breathing heavily. It looked like it was taking tremendous effort to calm himself down. Grover abruptly realized that this had been a bad idea. Mentioning her had been a bad idea, for whatever reason. But he had  _ needed  _ to know. What kind of friend would he be if he didn’t worry about the people he cared about? 

When Percy opened his eyes again, they were cold, no hint of the friendliness Grover had become accustomed to remaining. Grover took a step forward, his arm outstretched with the intent of, well, he didn’t really know, but-

“There’s always a time limit,” Percy muttered, shaking his head to himself. “I should’ve  _ known _ …” Grover had no clue what he was talking about. 

“Are you o-”

“Yeah, the name sounds familiar,” Percy interrupted. “Do you want to see her?”

“Would you let me?”

“I would,” Percy said calmly. “You’ve been incredibly cooperative with your new arrangements, which I am grateful for and pleased to see.” Grover furrowed his brow at the formal tone Percy was taking with him. “Annabeth’s schedule is pretty occupied tomorrow, but depending on how it goes, she could be available in the evening. How does that sound?”

“Percy…” Grover began hesitantly. “D-Did I say something wrong?”  _ Why do I care?  _ He bit the insides of his cheek, hating how it felt to see Percy acting this way to him. Weren’t they…  _ No _ . They weren’t friends. What on Earth had he been thinking? Six days spent with Percy and Grover’s brain was already messed up. Percy was on  _ Kronos’s  _ side, not his. If Kronos gave the word, Grover was sure Percy would kill him right then and there, no matter how much time they had spent together.

“No,” Percy said, but it was obvious he had. “You’re dismissed for today. Tomorrow, you’ll report here at sunrise. Then you can escort me to the arena, where we can see your friend. If she survives, you might get to see her at dinner.”

“If - if she -” Grover stammered, eyes widening as he put two and two together. “You’re going to have her fight in a  _ cage match _ ?”

“Technically, it’s an arena.”

“That’s  _ barbaric _ ! You can’t possibly be okay with that. She could  _ die  _ there.”

“Why should I care?”

“ _ I  _ care!” Grover said, his voice rising. He didn’t know why. Percy’s eyebrows rose but he remained silent, quietly assessing his companion. There wasn’t a lick of anger on his face, no emotion at all; he could be an incredibly life-like statue for all Grover knew. It dawned on Grover that this was the first time in a while he had voiced his opinions this vehemently. Yet Percy was just listening, not looking annoyed or uncaring of what Grover thought. A surge of anger raced through him. Of course the first person to  _ actually _ listen to him had to be evil boy wonder over here. It was like some sort of cruel joke. “You have to help her, please, Percy - I… I can’t lose her,  _ please _ .”

“No.”

Grover scoffed. “You and Kronos are a matched pair, aren’t you? No wonder he likes you so much.”

“Is that supposed to offend me?” Percy smirked.  _ It was _ , Grover thought, but Percy didn’t look bothered by it at all. He had probably heard similar claims all his life. 

“I’ll do anything,” Grover blurted out instead. “Anything, whatever you ask. I-I’ll…” He realized he didn’t have anything to offer Percy. Oh, why,  _ why  _ did he start this conversation, he should have  _ known  _ that he wouldn’t get what he wanted. “Am I free to go?” he mumbled miserably. 

“You are.”

Grover hung his head, fumbling for something to say back. Something to convince Percy. But he wasn’t as smart as Annabeth was, nowhere  _ close _ . His heart thundered with some feeling he couldn’t place as he nodded minutely and turned his back on the boy Prometheus felt so sorry for. 


	6. Green, Grey, and Gold

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Annabeth is on her way to the arena, she interacts with one son of Poseidon, and Kronos shows he can occasionally be a decent person (but only around Percy)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for the comments on the past couple of chapters, they literally make my day so much better
> 
> I wrote this chapter in two days without that much editing just cause I felt like I needed to get something up, so my apologies for any errors
> 
> hope you enjoy!

They brought Annabeth out of her room at five o’clock in the morning, long before the sun rose. She did not need to be told where they were taking her; she already knew. She was awake before they came and did not struggle as they brought her with them. She wasn’t too happy to recognize one of the guards as the one she had spat blood at. 

“No funny business this time, girl,” the female guard muttered in her ear. Annabeth couldn’t find the energy to respond. She kept her head down low, just like last time, and didn’t bother looking for an escape route. She had been searching for one for  _ six days  _ and she had found nothing, so she probably wouldn’t find one now. 

They passed a large red door. Annabeth did not look inside, but she could feel someone staring at her. She kept her head down. They walked on for another twelve and a half minutes before they finally came to a stop in a room with blinding white lights. 

She didn’t realize she was supposed to do something until the female guard punched her in the shoulder. Annabeth glanced up with a glare. She faltered when she spotted the red armor they expected her to put on.

Flynn’s armor hadn’t been red. 

“Why does it look like that?” she asked. 

The guards exchanged glances with each other before simultaneously shrugging. Annabeth decided to drop the subject and, after her escorts exited the room, began to put the repulsive armor on. It felt like a burn everytime it made contact with her skin. She fought back the sickening feeling in her gut. The color reminded her of Flynn’s blood, soaking through the ground while he was torn apart limb by limb. 

She fumbled with the straps on an arm piece, her fingers clumsily trying to connect them. The flexible, hard material was cool against her touch, smooth and matte, like bone. Shuddering, she forced her eyes away and fastened them to her skin. Nausea curled in her stomach, gravitating up to her throat in dizzying waves. 

_ For Hazel _ . 

The innocent girl with ichor-colored eyes materialized behind Annabeth’s closed eyelids. Her name resounded through her mind like a mantra, clear and melodic, weighing and deep all at once, like a church bell. She harnessed the peacefulness that came with the one-word chant and put her newfound energy into compartmentalizing her thoughts. She was about to be thrown into an arena for a  _ death match _ . There would be no mercy, no miracles to save her once she stepped past the gleaming iron-wrought gates. It was just another torture chamber where the screams of the dying were heard, except her screams would be  _ savored  _ and relished, not blocked out by those who couldn’t stand them. Her death would not be grieved, it would be  _ entertainment _ . 

In other words, she absolutely could not be bothered and distracted by something as simple as the  _ armor _ she had to wear. 

She let her imagination run rampant as she picked up the next arm plate, losing herself to the dangerous riptide of her thoughts while she strapped it on. Her eyes drifted over and scanned the red color but did not register it, as if it was nothing more interesting than a blade of grass. 

She wondered who or  _ what  _ she would have to battle once she stepped into the arena. She obviously knew who the necklace belonged to, now that she’d witnessed Flynn’s horrific death. Wincing, she shielded that thought and thrust it ruthlessly to the side, beneath the closing lid on the box of all the things she vowed to think of later but never did. It probably wasn’t healthy, bottling up all this grief and anger and  _ rage _ . 

The Minotaur was not an option for her. She had seen the brutality and raw strength the monster was capable of exhibiting. The scene played out in her head. Severed limbs, agonizing screams, and guttural bellows of victory. So the necklace was out of the question. That left the crossbow and the pen. And maybe they would replace the necklace with another object, now that they knew she wouldn’t pick it. Three was a sacred number in the ancient Greek world; the Big Three, three Fates, three Furies, three people sent out on a quest at Camp Half-Blood. 

No matter how hard she thought, she couldn’t form even a  _ guess  _ as to who the pen belonged to. It was such an ordinary object, it was hard to imagine a monster using a mortal’s writing utensil to battle. That had to mean it belonged to a demigod. But who? If it really did belong to a half-blood… perhaps it was her best bet. She stood no chance against a monster by herself, especially one like the Minotaur. Her greatest chance for survival was battling someone who was on equal footing as her. 

Unless… She swallowed back another wave of nausea. Her knees felt weak under her too-light-to-be-healthy body. There was a possibility that she would have to fight a demigod prisoner. Someone who had been in that well of cages surrounding the torture chamber, the same place she had been in up until just recently. She was prepared to do a lot to survive and keep Hazel alive but the mere idea of trying to kill a weakened prisoner, possibly someone she  _ knew _ , someone she went to camp with, someone she  _ fought  _ with… It made her wonder how far she was willing to damage herself in order to stay alive. 

No, there was no way she would do that. She would rather die than have to kill someone she called a friend. The chance of that happening if she picked the pen up was too high. 

She would rather die.

And just for a moment, to what she knew would be her eternal shame, she considered it. 

For a fraction of a second, she thought that she could do it. Let herself perish in that arena. Subject Hazel to a terrible fate because why should Annabeth care?  _ Why  _ did she care about a girl she had only conversed with for a few minutes at best? Hazel could not be worth all the suffering Annabeth was putting herself through: subjecting herself to Kronos’s games, offering herself up as  _ entertainment  _ for beasts who could not by the barest definition be considered human. She  _ should  _ let Hazel die. 

It was more than a moment that she considered it. 

She wondered if that’s what experiences like the ones she had been through did to a person. Being forced to flee her own home, being hunted down by monsters across the globe, being manipulated by the people she  _ should  _ be proud to call family, being betrayed by her  _ best friend _ \- the person who had  _ promised  _ that he would never leave--

Perhaps, somewhere along the way, she had become as broken as the boy she hated with all her heart. 

_ War makes monsters of us all _ . 

Maybe… Maybe Hazel was a way for Annabeth to assure herself that she was nothing like Luke Castellan. She wasn’t evil. How could she be, when she was sacrificing this much to save a stranger? Hazel was as good as a lifeline between Annabeth and the hero she was barely convincing herself of being. She was Annabeth’s assurance that she wasn’t losing who she was at her core.

A knock on the door startled her out of her thoughts. She was grateful for it; she didn’t like the road her mind had taken her down.  _ Compartmentalize.  _ “Come in,” she called, briefly surprised that whoever it was had actually waited for her response instead of barging in. 

She blinked in surprise, attention settling on now-familiar raven hair. Percy glanced around the room with a sharp, trained eye to make sure they were alone, before slipping inside and shutting the door behind him. His footsteps were silent, eerily so, as if the ground itself held its breath at his movements. Annabeth knew she was. 

“Come to gloat?” She meant for it to sound dry,  _ mocking _ , but it came out raspy and weak. Curse the frailty that came with being imprisoned for months. 

Percy looked at her strangely. “What reason would I have to gloat?” he asked. As if he wasn’t looking forward to seeing her suffer, to seeing her death. As if he wouldn’t be cheering along with the monsters he surrounded himself with. As if he wasn’t a monster himself. 

Annabeth just pretended to ignore him and busied herself with the armor plates that went on her legs. The nimbleness of her fingers vanished into thin air, leaving her fumbling to get the straps right once more. Her cheeks burned and she turned her face away, just  _ knowing  _ that Percy was sneering at her with contempt. 

“You could at least pretend to look happy to see me,” Percy said, spotting a chair and strolling over to it. He lounged on it, bracing his hands on the armrests with an ethereal grace Annabeth had only seen Kronos display. Even the way he tilted his head to the side, eyes sharp and glinting, had the Titan Lord written all over it. She shuddered, hastily averting her gaze. 

“Why are you even here?” she asked warily. 

“Not out of the kindness of my heart,” Percy said, unknowingly voicing Annabeth’s exact thoughts out loud. “I usually don’t make trips down here to chat with Kronos’s contestants.” He wrinkled his nose, a surprisingly  _ human _ gesture. Annabeth wasn’t sure if it was out of disgust for her and her current position or Kronos’s choice of entertainment. Probably the former. “But then again, I don’t usually have mutual friends with the contestant either.” 

“You have a friend… who is also a friend… with me,” Annabeth said dumbly. 

Percy nodded, taking her confusion in stride. His eyes were oddly flat, that conniving sparkle she’d caught sight of dulling, like silver losing its luster. “Grover Underwood. I believe you know him. He asked about you, after all, wanted to see you as soon as possible when I told him you were here, too.” 

“He…” Annabeth’s hand had found its way up to her mouth in shock. She could swear she felt her heart skip more than a few beats. Grover was here, Grover was  _ alive _ . “Oh gods… I haven’t seen him since that night in Manhattan when Luke-”

She cut herself off abruptly, barely suppressing the flinch that accompanied his name. Percy’s face was completely blank now, slate clean like a wiped memory. And somehow that in itself was easier to read than everything else about the boy in front of her. She wondered if he knew that the sudden mask he put on when nearing a dangerous subject  _ showed  _ his emotions more than it hid them. 

“Why do you do that?” she asked. 

“You’re going to have to be more specific, Annabeth dear,” Percy said, raising a mocking eyebrow. 

Annabeth gestured to him, eyes never leaving his face. She scoured over the mask like she would a piece of architecture, determined to locate every thought behind it. If he was uncomfortable with the sudden scrutiny, he did a good job of hiding it. He was probably used to it, being as close to Kronos as he was. She could see Prometheus looking at him the way she was now.

“It’s Luke, isn’t it?” 

“Again,” Percy shrugged, though she noticed his shoulders were stiffer, “an elaboration on your thoughts would help. Which Luke are you talking about? Luke Skywalker, or-”

“Luke Castellan.” The name felt like a slap to her face. She brushed aside the sting and refocused her efforts on figuring out the enigma before her. “He’s been with Kronos for nearly five years. You must have, too - how else would you and Kronos be as close as you are? So you  _ knew  _ Luke. Were you close to him, too? What did he do to…” 

Annabeth faltered and suddenly realized what it was she saw in Percy’s mask. “What did he do to hurt you?” she asked softly. Because Percy’s face was a perfect reflection of what Annabeth felt whenever she thought about Luke. She forced the very memory, the very  _ idea  _ of Luke Castellan out of her head, and left herself feeling cold and emotionless to escape the pain. It was the same method but Percy showed it in a different manner. 

Percy smiled, surprisingly, like it was exactly what he had expected her to say. It made her instantly doubt all the conclusions she’d come to about him. She couldn’t even tell if it was a genuine smile or just another lie. Was that what this whole interaction was? A lie? Was Grover even alive? Was she actually capable of interpreting Percy’s emotions or was it just a manipulation on his part, trying to appeal to her and lower her guard. 

“Is this how you prefer to deal with your enemies, Wise Girl?” Percy asked wryly. “By trying to detect some  _ good  _ in them, trying to find something human? Try to make them feel for you, sympathize with you, so you can win the day like the good little hero you think you are? I would’ve thought you learned your lesson with Luke, but I suppose I overestimated you. It didn’t work with him, did it?”

Annabeth paled. Stupid, she was so  _ stupid _ . To think that  _ she  _ had been the one reading  _ him _ when it had really been the other way around. Every word was like a punch to the gut, efficiently,  _ perfectly  _ placed. “You’re…”  _ Wrong _ . The word made her throat close up before she could get it out. 

Percy smirked as if he knew what she was thinking. “Not a very good liar are you? I’m right and you know it. You tried  _ so hard  _ to show him that you still care for him, and maybe he cared about you, too. But it was never enough because he still  _ left you _ in the end despite any  _ promises of a family  _ he made to you, and no matter how hard you tried he wasn’t going to come back. Because  _ everyone  _ leaves you in the end-”

That was quite enough. Her vision had grown red and all she could focus on was the roaring in her ears and that  _ damn smirk _ \-- Without thinking, she clenched her fists around the chest plate she hadn’t deigned to put on yet and  _ hurled  _ it towards that perfect face that she  _ hated  _ so much. 

Quick as lightning, a hand snatched up and caught the breast-plate. The arm lowered, revealing Percy’s look of surprise and  _ irritation _ . He threw the piece of armor back at her, the red material landing at her feet with a soundless thud. Satisfaction curled in Annabeth. She stooped down to pick it up, content in the fact that he had managed to annoy him. It was petty payback, but he deserved it for having the  _ audacity  _ to say any of what he’d just said. As if he  _ knew  _ her. 

“Now that we’ve got that out of your system,” Percy said pleasantly, “would you like to hear a little advice for the arena?”

Annabeth scoffed. “Why would you offer me advice?”

“Because Grover wants you alive. And I have to admit that I’ve grown a sort of… soft spot for him these past couple of days. So, this morning, I decided that I would do this for him. I assure you that, if it were up to me, you would step into that arena with absolutely no chance of making it out. Be sure to thank him when you see him tonight. Well,  _ if  _ you survive, that is.” 

“You’re despicable,” Annabeth snapped.

“When you go in, you’re going to have a choice of three objects,” Percy said as if she didn’t know that already. She bristled but he plowed on before she could interrupt. “I’m sure you’ve already guessed that the necklace won’t be there. The Minotaur did get a bit carried away in the last match, I must admit.”  _ A bit?  _ Annabeth wanted to exclaim. “There will be a crossbow like the last time. If you think about it, you can probably guess who it is. Then there’s going to be a monocle.” 

She startled at that. Was he seriously just giving her this information like this? “A monocle,” she echoed, previous anger temporarily forgotten. “Is it a monster or a human?”

“Who says humans can’t be monsters?” Percy chuckled at Annabeth’s annoyed expression. “I can’t just give  _ all  _ of it away, where’s the fun in that? The only piece of advice I have for you, though, and I strongly suggest you listen to it, is not to choose the pen.”

“Why not?” Annabeth frowned. 

Percy slowly stood up and walked over to her, strides weighty and sinister like a panther in the night.  _ Kronos _ , Annabeth thought again. Bile rose in her throat. Sea green eyes stared at her and she would have thought them beautiful if they weren’t full of undisguised hatred. For  _ her _ . “Because, Annabeth darling,” he drawled, “that pen belongs to me. Don’t choose it because then I  _ will _ kill you. You will not get any mercy from me because I  _ want  _ you dead, by my hands no less. Unfortunately, that involves upsetting Grover, so please refrain from doing so. Then I won’t have to kill you just yet.”

_ Yet _ . 

The threat hung high in the air, suspended above two teenagers on opposite sides of an ended war. 

Annabeth swallowed and didn’t miss how Percy’s eyes darted down to trace the motion, his eyes still blazing with cool dislike. She didn’t understand any of it. What had she done to make him despise her to this degree? Sure, she had probably insulted him and caused problems, but nothing she’d done could possibly warrant  _ this _ … 

“Why?” she whispered, hating how her voice gave away her fear. 

What she got in response was surprising honesty. A flicker of pain peeked behind Percy’s solid walls. “Because I can’t look at you without remembering what I lost,” he murmured. “You’re nothing more to me than a debt unpaid, one that I can never truly fulfill. I made a promise, too, you know. And like Luke… that promise binds me to the person who causes me the most pain in the world.” 

Without another word, he turned and left, footsteps eerily silent. Annabeth didn’t hear the sound of the door closing. Her hands were shaking, her heart pounding away like a hammer to her chest’s anvil. She managed to get her last piece of armor, the chest plate, on before her knees gave way and she tumbled to the ground, still trembling. 

_ You tried so hard to show him that you still care for him.  _

The door opened again and her two guards returned. They didn’t ask for permission or give a warning before they hoisted her up, no doubt thinking that she was just breaking down over anticipation of the arena. Part of it was that, of course, but it was Percy’s previous words that haunted her more. 

_ … it was never enough, because he still left you in the end despite any promises of family he made... _

She was walking outside of the door now, down dimly lit hallways that all looked the same. It blurred in her peripheral vision, shifting into a single continuous mirage. The hands clutching her shoulders to guide her lessened significantly. She wasn’t that much of a threat with the state she was in. Completely complacent, broken down at last, as far as the guards were concerned. 

Don’t pick up the pen. 

_ No matter how hard you tried he wasn’t going to come back.  _

It was true, painfully true. Annabeth knew it had been her greatest weakness during the war. She had been so  _ desperate  _ to hold onto Luke, onto the idea of family. To the idea of  _ what might have been _ . And in the process, she had overlooked the fact that there was no getting it back. Luke was lost to her but she had insisted that he was coming back. 

He never had.

_ Because everyone leaves you in the end. _

And that was the sentence that disturbed her the most. Because that was the one sentence out of what he had said that didn’t apply to her. It was one of her great fears but so far it hadn’t come true. Chiron, her friends: Thalia, Jason, Nico, Will… They had never left her. They had been right by her side until the very end. 

She was back on Olympus, crouching on the floor with a wound in her side and a concussion. Thalia was a few feet away, frozen by the will of a raven-haired boy. Luke’s form was burning up, spears of golden light bursting through his skin. His screams lit up the air, so  _ real  _ and disturbing that Annabeth could vividly hear them as she walked through the hallways of Kronos’s compound. 

“He’s in pain,” Thalia had said. 

Annabeth had looked up at who she was addressing, watching very carefully. Even then she’d been unable to keep her eyes off the boy’s face, so stunningly perfect and beautiful and… full of grief. She hadn’t been imagining that, she thought. That had been as real as Luke’s shrieks of agony. 

Percy’s words a couple of minutes ago had not been a way of lashing out at her, at  _ hurting  _ her. At least, that had not been their true intention. It had been a deflection. Her anger had taken her mind off trying to puzzle him out. Because she had gotten too close to the truth. So he’d started talking, in a blind panic though he hadn’t shown it, and he had not stopped. She wondered what he would have said if she hadn’t snapped at him, hurled that chest plate to get him to shut up because she thought he was talking about  _ her _ . 

He was talking about himself. 

“Luke…” she whispered, low enough that the guards couldn’t make it out. “What on earth did you do?”

\---

_ What did he do to hurt you?  _

Percy scowled and shoved his hands into the pockets of his jeans. Two guards patrolling the hallway must have sensed his bad mood, for their hands shot up to salute him much quicker than they usually did. He barely heard their shaky  _ My Lord _ s, preoccupied in his own head as he was. It was a stupid thing to call him anyway, no matter how hard Kronos had tried to convince him otherwise. 

“Are you feeling alright, My Lord?” one of them had the gall to ask. Percy whipped his head around to stare at him disbelievingly. Kronos would have punished a guard for so much as looking directly at Percy if he was here. The guard hastily bowed his head, shuffling back with small steps until his back hit the wall. He was trembling. Percy relaxed slightly, still half-expecting the Titan Lord to show up out of nowhere and drag the guard to the torture chamber.

The only one with who Percy should indulge in conversation was Kronos. At least, that’s what the Titan Lord had taught him over the years. Everyone else was beneath the two of them, dirt on the underside of their shoes, born to kneel at the feet of the throne they shared.

“There is something you can do for me,” Percy said once he was sure Kronos would not be making any sudden appearances. The guard’s head jerked but he wisely did not raise himself to look Percy in the eye. He stayed where he was, bowing and quivering with fear.  _ That’s all they’re good for _ , Kronos’s voice rang in Percy’s head. He ignored it. “Could you tell Prometheus I won’t be there for Ms. Chase’s match? I will be otherwise occupied.” 

“Right away,” the guard stammered. 

Satisfied, Percy turned to leave--

“He wishes to speak with you, Lord.” The other guard kept himself rigidly still, tension radiating from his posture. “He’s waiting for you in your chambers.” It was quite obvious who they were talking about.

Percy nodded. He hesitated and as a last-minute decision said, “Thank you.”

The widening of their eyes was as good an indication as any that saying that had been a mistake. Percy bit the insides of his cheek and swept away, taking care not to glance over his shoulder to witness more of their reactions. He really shouldn’t be talking to them like that. 

That conversation with the Chase girl must have bothered him more than he realized. It grasped him by the shoulders and shook him, jarring his world and jumbling his thoughts. He could see her face as she studied him so clearly. Kronos had always mocked his art skills but Percy thought for sure that he could sketch every detail of Annabeth’s expression from memory. Her face, open like a book, offering up her emotions for him to read like no one had in a long time. 

Here, everyone was cold. Everyone had hidden motives, a  _ reason  _ for doing the things they did. People here just didn’t  _ do  _ things for the sake of doing them; there was always something they expected in return, a price to pay. It was the world Percy had grown up in and had been forced to adapt to. If it wasn’t for Prometheus and Kronos, he would have been broken down by the strain of it a long time ago. 

But Annabeth… She was different. Percy wasn’t sure if he hated that or was relieved by it. She was… an impossible anomaly, something that shouldn’t exist, a burning flame that somehow could not be extinguished as it burned beneath arctic seas. And her eyes… The look in them as she quietly asked him about Luke Castellan… Percy had only seen that kind of kindness and warmth in one other person’s. 

Well, he amended, he thought he did. That person must be a figment of his own imagination. A way his subconsciousness had helped him cope as he grew up in a world of monsters and Titans. An imaginary friend, in some ways. A woman with stunning,  _ beautiful  _ blue eyes and brown hair, face impossibly soft and  _ loving _ . Sometimes when he thought of her he caught a whiff of freshly baked cookies and cheerful laughter, warm hugs, and, the most bizarre of all, the color blue. Why a  _ color  _ had any significance in his subconscious was beyond him. 

_ What did he do to hurt you?  _

Annabeth had gotten so close.  _ Too  _ close for comfort. And, like an idiot, Percy had tried to play it off, and in doing so had spouted out more than half a dozen of his most painful thoughts, hoping that she wouldn’t notice. But he knew that hope was futile; she was a wise girl and would no doubt realize what he’d done by the end of the day. 

He just hoped she died in that arena so he wouldn’t have to face her after that embarrassing exchange. He should have known better than to go down there in the first place. All she did was confuse and infuriate him. He didn’t want her warmth, he didn’t want her kindness, because with that came the pain she brought him. The grief and the self-loathing that he didn’t want to deal with for at least a century. He wanted her dead dead  _ dead _ \--

Cursing under his breath, he swung open the door to his chambers, entering a small sitting area that served as a bridge between the hallway and his bedroom. Kronos was sitting there, one leg casually folded over the other. He was relaxed, guard lowered in a way it wasn’t with anyone besides Percy. 

Percy’s face broke out into a smile as he shut the door behind him. Kronos waved a lazy hand and Percy felt the tingling itchiness of magic at work. Invisible barriers branched out around them, ensuring there would be no eavesdroppers or unwelcome visitors. Once he was done, he stood up and Percy practically ran to him, embracing him like he always did when Kronos returned from battle. 

Chuckles resounded through the Titan Lord’s chest, deep and amused. “You were right, after all,” he mused. “It did take longer to beat them without you there.” 

Percy snorted and withdrew, smirking playfully. “This battle did take you quite a while.”

“Obviously I was losing on purpose at first so I could stay away longer,” Kronos nodded. “Time away from you is a reprieve. A week or so without any headaches, being teased in front of my army generals…” He sighed, as if in deep regret. “I should’ve stayed away longer.”

Percy nodded eagerly to show that he agreed. Kronos chuckled and collapsed back on the couch. After a second, Percy followed suit and lounged on the one opposite of Kronos, grinning as he put his sneakers straight on the table. The Titan Lord blanched, staring at the soles of Percy’s shoes as if they’d personally offended them. 

“Run into any trouble while I was away?” Kronos asked. 

“No, not really,” Percy said, tracing the armrest with his finger. “It was terribly dull without you, though. I almost got to the point where I missed your presence… Ridiculous, I know.”

Kronos shook his head. “You might be the only one I know who would actually miss my presence.” It wasn’t said bitterly, more like a statement of fact. “Everyone else must have been relieved not to be ordered around. They’re growing complacent and  _ lazy  _ now that the war is coming to an end. These arena matches are only adding on to that.” He grimaced. “They need to be whipped up into shape. Not you, obviously. I wouldn’t subject you to that.”

“Because I’m your favourite,” Percy asked innocently. 

“Because you’re my favourite,” Kronos agreed. 

“Then send me out on the field.”

Kronos frowned up at him. “I beg your pardon?”

Percy sighed, dropping his stare. He reluctantly removed his feet from the top of the table and leaned forward, showing Kronos that he was being serious. He needed to get away from this place. From  _ her _ . “I want to go back out there. I have been cooped up here ever since the war ended.” Kronos didn’t look convinced. “With Prometheus,” Percy added, and just like that the Titan’s face shifted. It darkened significantly, and if Percy wasn’t as close with Kronos as he was, he would have had the good sense to be scared.

“He’s still at it?” Kronos asked grimly. “Approaching you, trying to get you to talk with him.”

Percy nodded, knowing that Kronos wouldn’t want a single detail left out. The Titan Lord was extremely cautious when it came to Prometheus. “He forced me into Grover Underwood’s company,” he said. An indistinguishable emotion crossed Kronos’s face, but he waved for Percy to continue anyway. “Grover’s good fun, I can’t see him posing much of a threat. I can handle him. It’s…” Here, he hesitated. 

“It’s…?” Kronos prompted. 

“It’s Annabeth that’s bothering me,” Percy said quietly. 

Kronos narrowed his eyes. His face was drained of color. If Percy didn’t know any better, he would think the Titan Lord looked nervous. “Ms. Chase?” He said in a tone that suggested Percy use that honorific instead of her first name. Percy nodded his confirmation. “Do you remember what I told you when you requested her?”

“It’s not like I requested her by  _ choice _ ,” Percy protested. “I remember expressing my thoughts  _ very  _ clearly on the matter. If I didn’t owe  _ him _ a debt, I would have killed her myself by now.”

“What did I tell you about her?” Kronos reiterated.

“You told me not to underestimate her. That she’s smarter than she looks and could get the upper hand over me if I’m not careful. But anyway, we’re getting off topic,” Percy said, hardly taking notice of the wariness in Kronos’s eyes. “Why can’t I join you out there?”

“Percy…”

“Is it because I’m not strong enough yet?” Percy raised his eyebrows. “You’ve taught me everything, Kronos, I’ve been training with you for  _ years _ . Am I not powerful enough, do I not live up to your expectations--?”

“No,” Kronos said immediately, insistent. “No, you could never disappoint me, Percy. You exceed all my expectations. You’re  _ perfect _ . It’s just… Poseidon has not been caught yet.” Percy’s face soured at the mention of his father. “Exactly. You know that he wants you back. I can’t let that happen… I don’t want to lose you.”

“Fine,” Percy sighed, reclining again and putting his feet back to their former position. Kronos grimaced. “Then at least let me go back out there once you’ve caught him.”

“When I’ve caught him, you’re free to do whatever you want,” Kronos said. “Raid that video game section of his palace you keep complaining about. Go to college, live among the mortals for a time if that’s what you want.” Percy scoffed. “Burn the whole world down if we haven’t done so by the time Poseidon is captured.”

“I would do it right now if that’s what you wanted,” Percy said. “You would only need to ask, you know.” 

Kronos’s smile was slow and easy. “I know.” 


End file.
